“[Thomas said] "I have my cell phone on me. Try to call before things start exploding.""Maybe this time it'll be different. Maybe I'll work everything out through reason, diplomacy, dialogue, and mutual cooperation."Thomas eyed me.I tried to look wounded. "It could happen.”

“Butters blinked at looked at Thomas. "My God," he said. "You've been shot."Thomas hooked a thumb at Butters. "Check out Dr. Marcus Welby, MD, here.""I'd have gone with Doogie Howser, maybe," I said."Split the difference at McCoy?" Thomas asked."Perfect.”

“Thomas hooked a thumb at Butters. "Check out Dr. Marcus Welby, MD, here.""I'd have gone with Doogie Howser, maybe," I said."Split the difference at McCoy?" Thomas asked?"Perfect.”

“It's different this time.""It was different last time."Thomas tried again. "This guy-""Has a third eye you can visibly see?”

“If your new boss wanted yo on the island, wouldn't she just have told you to go there?" Thomas asked."Seems like," I said. "Taking her orders is pretty much my job now."Molly snorted softly."Maybe I'll grow into it," I said. "You don't know."Thomas snorted softly.”

“Every time something really bad happens, people cry out for safety, and the government answers by taking rights away from good people. We have no proof that the bad, stupid crazy people who have planted bombs in the past few years used the phone much for their stupid bad crimes, let alone logged on the Internet. Yet when those kind of bad things happen nowadays, the government tries to do bad things to phones and the Net. The phones and the Internet are just good smart things, and the government should leave them alone. You have to watch the government all the time on everything. Thomas Jefferson didn't say that, but he said something very close to that.”