Quotes / Translator Microbes

Donna: Hold on a minute. That sign over there, it's in English. [disappointed] Are you having me on? Are we in Epcot?
Doctor: No-no-no, that's the TARDIS translation circuits. It just makes it look like English. Speech as well; you're talking Latin right now.
Donna: Seriously? I just said 'seriously' in Latin.

— Doctor Who, "The Fires of Pompeii"

Clara: Pretty bad "spies", mate. I don't even speak Russian!
Soviet Officer: ...what?
Clara: I don't... [to the Doctor] Am I speaking Russian right now?
Doctor: Yep.
Clara: Are they speaking Russian?
Doctor: Of course they are! They're Russians!

— Doctor Who, "Cold War"

Simon: What's English?
Bill: Er, what you're speaking in.
Simon: You're speaking Latin.
Bill: I'm not.
Simon: That's Latin. You just said that in Latin.
Bill: Ah! It's the Doctor. Or the Tardis. Or both. Something... telepathic... link. Auto-translate. That's why everyone in space speaks English.
Simon: What on Earth are you talking about?
Bill: Oh my God, it even does lip-sync.

— Doctor Who, "The Eaters of Light"

"They try to talk to me all the time. But all they hear is 'pika pika'."

— Detective Pikachu, Pokémon Detective Pikachu

"You're the one who can hear us, aren't you?"

— An owl, Dr. Dolittle

Tangle: Wait. You can talk?
Cyan Wisp: alien language]
Tangle: [puts on Whisper's mask] Say again?
Cyan Wisp: I said "Of course we can talk."
Tangle: [excited] The mask lets you talk to Wisps!

— Tangle and Whisper miniseries issue #3, from Sonic the Hedgehog (IDW)

"When the Captain made a vague noise of appreciation in response to my breasts, the device scanned his mind, interpreted the context and psi-cast the equivalent meaning in Vulcan while simultaneously (using chronoton sideshift to avoid time-loss) refracting the light waves around his mouth so his lips appeared to be saying those words."

— T'Pol, Farce Contact (a Star Trek: Enterprise Parody Fic by Odon)

Analyzer: [speaking Gamilan] We hereby welcome you aboard as a ceasefire ambassador.
Melda Deitz: Your Gamilan is difficult to understand, droid. [presses device on neck as she begins speaking in Japanese/English] There's no need for it, I can translate your language with this device.

— Space Battleship Yamato 2199

Captain Jamieson: All right, attention, everyone. For the first time in history, we may hear what a being from another world is trying to communicate to us. My God! Switch on the translating circuits.
The Creature: [singing] I want to eat... your face. It could just be... so yuuuumy! I'd like to have your face... in my tummy!

— The Creature Wasn't Nice (1983)

Hal Jordan: You speak English?
Abin Sur: No... it's the ring.

— Green Lantern: First Flight

Alex: You speak English?
Rylan Officer: No, you hear English thanks to the translator device.

— The Last Starfighter

"I spoke another language? But how could I speak another language without knowing I can?"

— Harry Potter, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets

The Babel fish is small, yellow, leech-like, and probably the oddest thing in the Universe. It feeds on brainwave energy received not from its own carrier, but from those around it. It absorbs all unconscious mental frequencies from this brainwave energy to nourish itself with. It then excretes into the mind of its carrier a telepathic matrix formed by combining the conscious thought frequencies with nerve signals picked up from the speech centres of the brain which has supplied them. The practical upshot of all this is that if you stick a Babel fish in your ear you can instantly understand anything said to you in any form of language.

— The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

Elma: Tatsu, the Ganglion, and now these Ma-non. Don't you find it a little odd that we can understand these alien languages?
Lin: Huh... good point.
Rook: Maybe they learned our language?
Elma: I doubt it... Tatsu, did you study our language?
Tatsu: Friends' language?
Elma: What language are we speaking right now?
Tatsu: What language? Nopon, of course! Friends' Nopon very good, by the way.
Elma: See? Xenoforms have different anatomy, physiology, different vocal setups in general. It seems likely they would struggle with our pronunciations. And yet, here we are, conversing.
Lin: But if they can't even produce the sounds... this shouldn't be possible.
Elma: No, it shouldn't be. Unless... our words aren't being perceived as sounds at all. Maybe our intent is getting across some other way... But how? ...Could it be something about this planet?
Lin: Heh. Someone sounds pretty intrigued, huh.
Elma: Well, what if it is some kind of new phenomenon? Aren't you curious to learn more?

— Xenoblade Chronicles X

---