Stardate 48212.4: Preparations
are being made aboard DS9 for an
inevitable visit from the Dominion, but no one can
escape the fact that the station would wither under
an attack from the Jem'Hadar. Commander
Sisko, having gone to
Earth for Starfleet briefings on the threat from the
Gamma Quadrant, arrives in the experimental
Federation vessel Defiant, a small ship originally created to do
battle with the Borg. Carrying more firepower than
any other Starfleet ship and a cloaking device loaned
by the Romulans, the Defiant is to go to the Dominion
before the Dominion arrives in the Alpha Quadrant; if
need be, the ship is also to take the fight to the
other side of the galaxy. Another innovation brought
about by Starfleet Command is the transfer of a
Starfleet security officer to the station, relieving Odo of all but station-bound security
matters. The shapeshifter withdraws in anger while
Sisko assembles a crew for the Defiant's mission to
seek out the Dominion for negotiations, but joins the
Defiant crew at the last minute. A trade contact of Quark's offers some information but little help
in the search for the Founders of the Dominion, but
does point the crew out to a planet through which
most Dominion communications pass. When the Defiant
arrives there, Dax and O'Brien beam down and find the possible
coordinates of the Dominion command center - and are
captured by the Jem'Hadar, who have also arrived in
force in orbit. The Defiant manages to take out only
one Jem'Hadar ship and barely survives the withering
assault of the remaining attackers. The Defiant is
boarded and Kira is
blasted unconscious in the ensuing melee. Odo takes
her and evacuates in an escape shuttle, heading not
back to the station, but to a planet in the Omarian
Nebula with which he has been preoccupied since
arriving in the Gamma Quadrant. The planet turns out
to be the home of a race of life forms very like Odo
himself, one of which welcomes him home.
