Art imitates life: over the past few days I've been watching the fourth season DVD set of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. The last one for tonight was an episode entitled "Rules of Engagement," where Lieutenant Commander Worf is on trial for extradition to the Klingon empire for having accidentally fired upon and destroyed a civilian transport in the heat of battle. It turns out that a passenger list bandied about by the opportunistic Klingon advocate is identical to the list of a transport feared destroyed two weeks before Worf's incident — so in fact the ship was a decoy, Worf is innocent, and the Klingons are caught in an attempt at political manipulation.
But what struck me was that when the advocate was shown the roster list by an interviewing Captain Sisko, he answered the question of his familiarity with it by claiming the names were "seared" — yes, seared — in his memory. Though not really.