S1 E8 – SPACE

SCULLY: “Why would somebody want to sabotage the Space Shuttle?”

MULDER: “Well, if you were a terrorist, there probably isn’t a more potent symbol of American progress and prosperity. And if you’re an opponent of big science, NASA itself represents a vast money trench that exists outside the crucible and debate of the democratic process. And of course there are those futurists who believe the Space Shuttle is a rusty old bucket that should be mothballed. A dinosaur spacecraft built in the 70’s by scientists setting their sights on space in an ever declining scale.”

SCULLY: “And we thought we could rest easy with the fall of the Soviet Union.”

MULDER: “Not to mention certain fringe elements who accuse our government itself of space sabotage. The failure of the Hubble Telescope and the Mars Observer are directly connected to a conspiracy to deny us evidence.”

MULDER: “You never wanted to be an astronaut when you were a kid, Scully?”

SCULLY: “Guess I missed that phase.”

SCULLY: “Is it conceivable that in order to avoid these delays, the program is being pushed ahead without proper safety precaution?”

TECHMECH GUY: “Look, there are about 17000 things that can go wrong with the shuttle, and about 17000 people who make sure they don’t.”

MULDER: “I can’t believe how much faith we put in machines.”

MULDER: “I have to admit, that fulfilled one of my boyhood fantasies.”

SCULLY: “Yeah, it ranks right up there with getting a pony and learning how to braid my own hair.”

BELT: “Heroes? We used to make headlines when we did our job right. Now they bury them in the back of the paper. Name me two astronauts on the last shuttle mission. You make the front page today only if you screw up. They only know your name if you’re the unlucky SOB sitting on 500 tons of dynamite. That’s what they’re really waiting for.”

MULDER: “Hey, Scully, we send those men up into space to unlock the doors of the universe, and we don’t even know what’s behind them. I think whatever it was, he took it with him. And in the end that was the only way he knew how to stop it.”