History WMG / StarTrekDeepSpaceNine

[[WMG: Odo and the other changelings are the result of [[Anime/NeonGenesisEvangelion Instrumentality]].]]

* Not all Trill ''want'' to be joined, though (Ezri didn't); it's a huge responsibility, not to mention that having to partially give up one's own individual identity would be offputting to some. Ezri's mother's attitude could just be her particular personality rather than reflective of the entire unjoined Trill population.

In the TNG episode “The Perfect Mate” an empathic metamorph is someone who not only senses the emotions of others, but emulates their personality to perfectly please whoever they’re with. Rom has displayed this behavior over the course of the series. In the early episodes, he was greedy and misogynistic like Quark, because he spent most of his time working with Quark. In the episode “The Nagus” he tried to kill Quark...because that was what Brax wanted and Rom wants whatever whoever he is associating with wants. As the series progresses Rom becomes more good-natured and altruistic because he associates with Federation and Bajoran citizens. He even goes from being cowardly when faced with death to being brave in the face of Dominion execution, and who was he spending most of his time with at that point? Major Kira. By the time Rom gets with Leeta, the Bajoran dabo girl, he’s quoting Bajoran spiritual texts and wearing the earring like a Bajoran, and only stops when someone reminds him he’s a Ferengi. Rom not only reads people, but he knows exactly how to compensate accordingly.

When Joran was the Dax host, he was just psychologically unstable with various personal issues, making him dangerous but not the Hannibal-Lecter-esque killer he was in his later appearances. However, after Jadzia learned about Joran's existence and what he had done, on some level she began to exaggerate the scale of his crimes to reinforce that the Symbiosis Commission had been 'right' to keep Joran locked up, which led to the memory of Joran's personality in Dax becoming so twisted.

[[WMG: Ben Sisko is the descendant of [[Literature/Spenser Hawk]].]]

[[WMG: Disney/TreasurePlanet ''also'' takes place on ancient Bajor.]]

[[WMG: Miles O'Brien prime really was KilledOffForReal in "Visionary" & was replaced by an alternate universe O'Brien.]]
When O'Brien uses delta radiation to travel into the future, he encounters his alternate who is unaffected by radiation. They both mention this inconsistency, but if they both are the same, then O'Brien Prime dying of radiation should prevent the other O'Brien from living.

It's possible that Alt. O'Brien is experiencing the same events of this episode in [[ParallelUniverse own universe]], but with some different choices made. Alt. O'Brien is somehow returned to the prime universe and is able to stay because an object of equal mass has replaced the missing O'Brien Prime. Deep Space 9 is destroyed in the alternate universe, & Alt. O'Brien replaces the deceased O'Brien Prime in the prime universe.

With the destruction of Deep Space 9 in this alternate universe, the Dominion War unfolded and finished very differently.

[[WMG: The {{Sufficiently Advanced Alien}}s in ''Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine'' are the [[Main/StarWars Force ghosts]] of Jedi and Sith Lords.]]

[[WMG: Alternately, the whole StarTrek franchise is created by Benny Russell, who becomes the fictional equivalent to Creator/GeneRoddenberry.]]

[[WMG: The Founders' standard appearance is an (attempted) imitation of the appearance of the ''original'' Humanoid we see in the ''[[Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration The Next Generation]]'' episode "The Chase".]]
They look suspiciously similar. Of course, the female Founder is played by the same actress (Salome Jens), but the makeup is also similar (except for the ears).
* The problem with this theory is that it's canon that Odo's appearance was due to him not being very good at doing faces -- and, indeed, in the episode "Children of Time" future!Odo has a slightly more humanoid (but still not perfect) face. The reason why all the other Founders look like that is because they're copying Odo.
** What if the Bajoran people, which Odo was trying to mimic, are closer to the founders genetically.
* In one episode, Odo is visited by another changeling, Laas, who hasn't made contact with the Founders. Laas' humanoid form appears to be mimicking whatever species he grew up around, although with an Odo-esque 'smoothness' to it, with no lips or eyebrows. And Laas doesn't have the "can't do one of your noses" excuse - he's an expert shapeshifter who can turn into fire, fog, and even a freakin' warp-capable ''starship''. This suggests there's some 'pure' Changeling-humanoid look in there somewhere. If the other Founders were purely imitating Odo, why don't they all look like the same actor?
* Alternatively, the Founders ARE the Precursors. All the evidence is there: they admit themselves that they used to be "solids", implying quite an old race, and they also state that they used to explore the galaxy, as the Precursors did. The Female Changeling looks like she does because she's acting as a mouthpiece for the Founders, like the Precursor in "The Chase", and that form was found to be most effective.

[[WMG: Eris (the first Vorta to appear in ''[[Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine Deep Space Nine]]'') was not really a Vorta, but something completely different.]]
Eris was able to beam away from the Station with no Dominion ships ''anywhere'' nearby (and we know that the Dominion does not use cloaking devices). If the Dominion had this technology, why do they never use it again? My guess is that Eris is not really a Vorta, but something entirely different.
* Alternatively: she beamed nowhere. She's now a discorporated mass who sent her intel she gathered already. If she's a Vorta, she's basically a disposable, replaceable clone.
* FridgeBrilliance: If you take this together with the WMG further above that ''WesternAnimation/SinbadLegendOfTheSevenSeas'' takes place on ancient Bajor instead of earth, you get... something extremely weird.
* She ''was'' the only Vorta to ever display telekinetic abilities.
* Maybe she was a clone of the original prototype of the Vorta species. Maybe the Vorta were originally designed with telekinetic abilities. Maybe the Vorta were originally intended to be the Dominion's footsoldiers as well as diplomats, but at some point the Founders decided that it would be better to create two weaker species which they could easily control, rather than one single "supersoldier" species: they removed the Vorta's psi powers and kept them on as administrators and diplomats, and then they engineered the Jem'Hadar as a more easily controlled species of supersoldiers without tricky psi powers that could threaten the Founders. However, every once in a while, the Dominion activated an Eris clone when they felt they needed her. She would be programmed to complete a single mission and then commit suicide in the most convenient way possible, such as by beaming into space.
* The transporter part was {{Jossed}} on-screen: Dominion transporter was stated having range of at least three light years, when enchanched with a homing transponder like [[http://images2.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20050913103625/memoryalpha/en/images/a/a6/Transporter_crystal.jpg the one used to kidnap Kira and move her from ''Deep Space 9'' to ''Empok Nor'']]. Maybe she had one of those in her pocket. Still doesn't explain the telekinetic abilities...
** As someone who features Eris in his fanfiction extensively, I think she is one of a handful of Vorta who opted for telekinesis when she first became a clone.

[[WMG: The Dominion didn't defeat the Maquis.]]
The only information we have is the intelligence gathered by Starfleet's secret service. We never ''see'' it happen. Also, it's very unlikely: neither the Cardassians nor the Federation were able to defeat the Maquis, and the Dominion isn't THAT much more advanced.
* It wasn't a matter of tech. It was a matter of will and resources. The Federation doesn't (publicly) engage in atrocities, while the Cardassians didn't really have the resources to wipe them out and withstand the inevitable backlash from the Federation. The Dominion were perfectly fine with committing atrocities, and they could easily withstand any attack at that point. Also, one of the biggest sources was Mike Eddington, who ''was'' a member of the Maquis, and was trying to evacuate the last survivors of his cell in his last appearance.
* That one guy from VOY "Repression" was still around.
* We see that some Maquis raiders were in the later big battles in the war. I assume a few survivors took their ships and joined with the Federation fleets to get back a the Dominion.

[[WMG:The Prophets didn't need Sisko to explain anything to them.]]
They were putting on a act in order to force him to come to terms with his own grief, because the Prophets work in mysterious ways.

[[WMG: Q doesn't bother the station much because of the Prophets.]]
When he shows up, he doesn't do anything truly Q-like--he basically annoys everybody because why not. He didn't do any truly spectacular things out of courtesy to the Prophets, who don't like other godlike beings playing in their backyard.

[[WMG: Commander Sisko created the Bajoran Religion.]]
The Prophets live outside of linear time. While they did send out probes, Cdr. Sisko is the first time any linear being responded to them. The Prophets then send out more probes to gather data; however, they appear at different time periods due to the Prophets living outside normal time. And since Sisko told the Prophets that they were of Bajor, the Prophets decided to fulfill their designated role as gods of Bajor. Some wanted to guide Bajor, others wanted to rule or destroy it; these later become the Pah-Wraiths.

The main evidence for this is the Prophets' behavior. They go from people who have no idea of Bajor to declaring "We are of Bajor," and performing various miracles that determine the course of Bajoran history (such as when they destroyed the invading Dominion fleet). There's also the sketchy evidence of the Bajoran symbol; when it is standing on end, it bears a vague resemblance to the Star Fleet Delta, with three points and a star. The reason the Prophets' behavior appears so contradictory is because they are operating outside of linear time; this allows them to meddle in Bajor's past as they grow more accepting of their apparent role as gods.

[[WMG: The Prophets was the factor that threw off the calculations of certain doom in "Statistical Probabilities"]]

As has been pointed out elsewhere, the Federation was supposed to lose even if both the Romulans joined the war on their side (which did happen) and the Cardassians began an anti-Dominion rebellion (which ''also'' happened, although only after the war was turning against the Dominion), and that, to all appearances, did not take into account the Breen joining when they did. So what turned the course of war towards victory? One major possibility is that it was the Dominion remaining cut-off from the Gamma Quadrant despite the minefield going down (that the minefield would go down eventually may well have been a statistical near-certainty in the calculations), which only happened because the very alien and very unknown Wormhole Aliens for once made a personal and impressive intervention in response to a desperate last-shot gamble by Sisko. The Jack Pack calculated based on it being inevitable that sooner or later the Dominion's Gamma Quadrant power could come into play, but in one swoop the Prophets ensured that would not happen -- and so allowed the Federation to win the Dominion War.
* It's actually pretty heavily implied by the show (though never directly confirmed) that the Prophets and Pah-Wraiths are applying subtle influences on the course of the war, considering that the alliance gets pretty bogged down when Dukat [[spoiler:sticks a Pah-Wraith in the wormhole]]. See the ''[[Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine Deep Space Nine]]'' entry on DivineConflict.
* They also probably did not calculate Section 31 attempting genocide. This and the Prophets not being included, showed that the Mutants calculations had many flaws because they lacked all the information.
** And then there's the fact that they predicted a rebellion led by earth five generations down the line, when a prior episode indicated that the Dominion was planning to preemptively glass Earth to prevent exactly this eventuality.
** I think it's actually much more likely that Sisko and the events of "In the Pale Moonlight" specifically are what threw off their war projections. The Jack Pack predicted that the Romulans would join the war against the Dominion, yes, but only after close to a year had passed (Season seven timeframe) and the Federation and the Klingons were that much weaker, and thus the alliance as a whole would have been in a weaker position. Their predictions were based on statistical analysis of the powers themselves, which would have included the Dominion '''not''' planning to invade Romulus yet specifically because they didn't want to scare the Romulans into the war, and thus the Romulans would have had no reason to join the war early (Presumably, the Jack Pack saw them joining the war in a year when the Dominion began gaining the definitive upper hand and the Romulans realized that the Klingons and Federation were really going down and they would soon find themselves facing the Dominion alone). They could have never foreseen Sisko manufacturing evidence or taking part in a deceptive plot to trick the Romulans into the war, both because their statistics don't deal with minute individual factors, and because even if it did they had no data to say that Sisko would have been willing to do such a thing (It doesn't matter how smart you are, if you don't have the right data you can't have the right conclusions). This is one of the few points in the entire series where one person really changed everything, where '''Sisko''' changed everything, and it's a point that they couldn't have predicted.

[[WMG: The Cardassians worshiped the Prophets, but under another name.]]
The lightship made it to a more prosperous Cardassia Prime. The pilot, unable to return to Bajor, taught the Cardassians the Bajoran religion, which became immensely popular. When the Bajorans and the Cardassians made contact, the similar religions actually became a talking point, and Bajor found out about the legend of the Bajoran pilot. Then the Cardassians became impoverished, and their government became intensely nationalistic. A combination of the Prophets never showing up and distaste towards 'foreign influences' caused the religion to dwindle into nothingness, but that still left a key aspect of their society that could potentially be traced back to another planet (not to mention one that had offered no comfort during the famine). Thus, Bajor became a target for 'uplifting', and the Occupation began.

[[WMG: The Sphere-Builders from ''Enterprise'' will become the Prophets]]
Both the Sphere-Builders and the Prophets are aliens living in a trans-dimensional realm beyond normal space and time, a realm that's depicted onscreen with all-encompassing white colour. Since the Sphere-Builders [[spoiler:appear to be humanoids and want to conquer the physical universe]], it seems likely they originally lived in this universe but were somehow [[spoiler:trapped in the trans-dimensional realm ages ago, and wish to return to their original home]]. However, after [[spoiler:their attempt to conquer the universe is thwarted and their connection to it cut,]] they decide to try and properly adapt to their new home. Eventually they will evolve to live fully beyond space and time, losing their physical bodies in the process, and becoming the beings Bajorans referred to as the Prophets. At some point a random wormhole opens up a new connection between the trans-dimensional realm and the physical universe, but at that point they have forgotten they'd ever existed outside their realm, and have no wish to leave it. The only exception to this is a subgroup among them called the Pah-Wraiths, who still hold on to some subconscious Sphere-Builder mentality, and who are therefore more interested in manipulating the physical universe and its inhabitants.

[[WMG: Tiron and Brunt are actually the same person]]
At the end of Meridian, Tiron tells Quark "I don't know how, and I don't know when, but I will ruin you". They established a rich man who usually gets what he wants, but he never does anything...
...Until you realize that he's played by Jeffery Coombs, who also plays Brunt and Weyoun (Weyoun isn't part of this WMG as I thought of it, but that doesn't mean he can't be). Now who is Brunt? He's the person who's always had it out for Quark and even revoked his business lisance for a short time. He was also first shown in late season three, while Tiron was only shown in an episode earlier in that season. Coincidence? I think not. I say after swearing to get back at Quark, he used his vast wealth to be surgically altered to look like a ferrengi, then got himself into the FCA via some well-placed bribes and afterwards did everything he could to make Quark suffer.

[[WMG: Commander Shelby and Benjamin Sisko worked together]]
Shelby was in all likelihood the person put in charge of the Borg desk at Starfleet. She was probably Sisko's superior on the Defiant project.
* I assume she is the one who pulled the plug on the Defiant project after the third or fourth time the ship tore itself apart in trails. So when Sisko was put out to pasture at [=DS9=] he probably harbored a lot of anger at Shelby for it, and then he had to kowtow to Locutus as well.

[[WMG: Continuity Gaff Apologism:]]
In the TNG episode "Up the Long Ladder" Worf busts out a Klingon tea set for some ceremony. The cups and pitcher used for the Klingon tea ceremony were seen again many years later in the ''[[Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine Deep Space Nine]]'' episode "The Ship". In that episode, the Vorta Kilana brings food and drink to Sisko using this tableware.
* Obviously she studied the Federation and Sisko. Discovering that Sisko's mentor and best friend was Curzon Dax who himself was obviously a lover of Klingon culture she felt that using this Klingon tea set would display subtle diplomatic overtures that Sisko would recognize and that would prey on his softer feelings of friendship for Curzon.

[[WMG: Jake accidentally becomes the 24th century L.Ron Hubbard]]
His novel Anslem becomes the fictional work that inspires an actual religion. Of course the atheistic Federation looks at this like a bunch of primitive whacko mumbo jumbo, but the adherents point to the obvious miracles of Captain Sisko as proof. Jake hating all of this becomes a recluse and never writes anything again. Of course this just further intensifies his mystery.
* Jake's younger brother marries Tom and B'Elanna's kid, the Kuvah'magh, and the two of them eventually become the head of the church of Sisko.
** God help us all if they get the Sword of Kahless.
* After Voyager returned Tom Paris's holoprograms became all the rage, as did Insurection Alpha. Tom tried his hand at holonovel writing and, though not very good was still famous. Tom scored big when he got permission to make the holonovel adaptation of Anslem (of course the books always better than the holonovel, we all know that). Tom got so famous from that he stopped piloting and turned to holonovel writing full time...unfortunately he was a hack at it and never produced a real hit of his own.


[[WMG: Bajorans would start playing baseball]]
To the Bajorans baseball would not only be the national pastime for the entire planet, it would actually be a religious observation. Each vedek temple would form a team to play in the league and each temple would have a baseball field, the bigger temples would be full on stadiums. Whichever temples wins The World Series gets to name the next Kai. Before each game a vedek would give a speech about the history of baseball, and how the Emissary used the lessons of baseball to explain linear time to the Prophets. Hot dogs and beer would become like the communion wafers.
* Buck Bokai and Willie Mayes would be like saints.
* The vedek temples would start ordaining ringers to make their temple teams the best.
* The Pah Wraith Cultists, atheists and half Cardassian children would have to play in a separate, unofficially recognized league.
* I assume the crew of ''[[Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine Deep Space Nine]]'' would be an official team as well. They would also have to open a league for aliens to play in.
* In fact it would become tradition in the Bajoran sector for each ship to form a team and when the ships come in to dock at [=DS9=] the crews play each other. These games get sent out across space and the ship crews develop sports fan followings and fame. It would become part of the tradition that the Umpire had to be a Vedic.

[[WMG: Jake Sisko is the 24th century Jack London]]

* A writer who spent his formative adolescence and early adulthood on a distant frontier outpost, played a major role in the Dominion War as a Starfleet correspondent and spy, emphatically rejected a Starfleet career to focus on his writing, turned down the Pennington School on Earth in favor of staying on the politically unstable and strategically important Deep Space Nine, has a thing for native Bajoran girls (He had a of girlfriends over the series and all of them were Bajoran), is a charmer, and a survivor. Is adventurous and the older he gets, the less he heeds his fathers' warnings to the point where his dad has to acknowledge that his son is old enough to make his own decisions... this "kid" has had enough adventures to write twenty books about life on the frontier, by the wormhole, in non-Federation space.

[[WMG: O'Brien's fluctuating rank]]
(Out-of-universe, it was a combination of Roddenberry's anti-classism ("we won't have officers and enlisted in the future!") and turning what was initially a nameless RedShirt into an AscendedExtra. But that's no fun!)
* My theory: O'Brien was an NCO who was made an acting officer first with the rank of ensign and later lieutenant with a reassignment to the operations division. All this was probably due to his distinguished war record. He had a lot of experience that even officers lacked and either Picard, Starfleet or both saw this potential. Alternatively he may have been made an officer so he could direct much younger Academy graduates, as although he had never gone there himself, as his experience and training were still considered assets. This might have been rescinded later in the series after O'Brien had seasoned his students on board the Enterprise, but because O'Brien is an engineering genius and a war veteran, Starfleet Command had a great amount of respect for him, so when his time as an acting officer was over, even as an NCO, he got to keep his officer's privileges, pay (if Starfleet pays, that's not clear), status, etc . My personal theory, and this is based on my understanding of O'Brien's character, is that prior to accepting his transfer to Deep Space 9, he seriously considered leaving Starfleet. In fact, he tried really, really hard to leave Starfleet, but Starfleet didn't want to let him go. He and Keiko had even made plans to move to Earth, settle down in a nice neighborhood in Kyoto, and one of Keiko's relatives would set O'Brien up with a cushy job, and the O'Brien family would never set foot on a spaceship again. Then, Starfleet made O'Brien an offer he couldn't refuse: basically he'd be the highest compensated NCO in the Federation, however it is that Starfleet compensates its officers. All he had to go was travel across the Federation to an abandoned Cardassian Space Station and make it work. And as much as O'Brien wanted to leave, his engineer's instincts took over and he couldn't refuse that challenge. O'Brien even said himself in the series that he was bored on the Enterprise and much happier on Deep Space 9 because something was always going wrong and he felt more needed there. It may be that on starbases, the Chief of Operations does most of that work, and chief engineers are more like starship officers who specialize in Warp Drive and other things a ship would have that a space station or a ground installation wouldn't. So O'Brien having that authority (ordering officers around despite being an NCO) makes sense on a relatively small outpost like Deep Space 9. But given how much I suspect O'Brien wanted to leave Starfleet before accepting the Deep Space 9 transfer, they must have offered him something even better than he got for working on the Enterprise, or I doubt he would have taken such an assignment considering that it involved moving his wife and very young daughter to a politically unstable, highly disputed area of space filled with criminals, terrorists, and Cardassian military paranoids. Think back and remember how unhappy Keiko was in the first season when she and Miles' relationship seemed the most strained... I always suspected that O'Brien had tried to leave Starfleet and Keiko had worked herself up over going home, only to be disappointed.
** I think you're close to the mark here. O'brien started out as an NCO. During the Cardassian war, he probably got a battlefield commission to Ensign (and later Lieutenant after he distinguished himself). He kept this for a time after the war ended. But once the war and the aftermath of it were clearly over, Starfleet gave him a choice of career paths, saying he could keep the commission, and start to take on officer rank and duties (leading to command), or he could keep his current duties and revert back to an NCO. I don't think O'Brien wanted his career to go to command, because it's not what he wanted to do, so he elected to revert to an NCO. All off-camera of course. This type of situation has happened a number of times in the real life military.
* I always thought that accepting posting at [=DS=]9 was one of those marriage compromises where everybody kinda got what they wanted, but kind didn't. After having Molly Keiko wanted to leave Starfleet because gallivanting around the galaxy with a child was dangerous, plus Myles had a little person thankless job on the ship. I'm sure [=DS=]9 spun life on a starbase orbiting a planet as a somewhat like settling down to make Keiko happy, and he got a real job.
** That could be the case. My theory still pins down the fluctuating rank between low ranking officer/high ranking NCO though. In "The Wounded" (a TNG episode) O'Brien's former captain referred to him as having been a tactical officer. We've never seen anyone below the rank of ensign take tactical, ever, except for O'Brien once to cover for Worf in [=TN=]G and later in [=DS=]9 on the ''Defiant'' at times. Seems like he got a temporary field promotion during the Cardassian Wars and Starfleet decided to let him keep it for a while for whatever reason (I assume his field experience and technical abilities) until later in TNG when he was preparing to transfer to [=DS=]9 (which meant losing his field promotion but getting a better job anyway). So he went back to being a CPO and retained all the prestige than a chief engineer would on a starship. After all, Starfleet Academy wanted him as a professor of engineering and he never went to the academy himself.
* In modern militaries it is not unusual for mustang officers (officers that worked their way up from the enlisted ranks) to revert to senior non-coms (usually at an equivalent pay grade) to take certain job positions. O'Brien may have earned a commission during the war (either a field promotion or even a regular one) and was eventually promoted to Lieutenant, possibly soon after transferring to the Enterprise as he is only wearing a single pip in Encounter at Farpoint. He most likely reverted to non-com status during TNG season 2 after he became Transporter Chief, though he continues to wear his Lieutenant pips for some time after this. This may be allowed by the Starfleet uniform code for a variety of reasons. Most likely he started out as the acting transporter chief or was on probationary status until the position became permanent. Until then he retained the option of returning to the officer ranks if he choose or if the new posting didn't work out. Once he formally accepted the position he had to wear non-com insignia on his regular uniform (He may have been allowed to retain his officer's dress uniform, as he again has two pips on his collar at his wedding.)


[[WMG: Pure Klingons and part-Klingon hybrids have very diverse aging patterns. It has nothing to do with hybridization with humans.]]
This would explain Alexander, Worf, Kang, Kor and Koloth's ages. Remember that statistical variation exists within any population. It may be that Klingon individuals are subject to more varied aging patterns, such that an 8 year old Klingon could either resemble a cognitive and physic young adult, an adolescent, or even a child, depending on their individual genetics. This leaves open the possibility that Worf was in his 20's during ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'' or possibly much younger like Alexander was when he joined the ''Rotarran's'' crew (9 years old and looking like an older teen or young adult). Officially Worf was in his twenties during ''Next Gen'', so maybe the super-aging comes from his mother's side of the family (and she was half human). But if the pattern holds, any Klingon young adult might be between 9 and 21 in human years. The onset of Klingon puberty might be much less regular or predictable among Klingons than humans or other species. Puberty could hit them at 6 or at 12-14. It depends on the individual and probably the developmental patterns in their families. If I had to guess I'd assume that Romulans and Vulcans experience something similar, since they can either look middle aged to elderly in their mid 100's, or much younger at the same age, like Tuvok from ''Series/StarTrekVoyager.'' This might complicate ''Ponn Farr'', though.

[[WMG: Worf has the Klingon version of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder]]
Compared to other Klingons, Worf is anal retentive. This was part of his own culture shock in early ''Next Generation'' episodes. He's often at odds with other Klingons. His quarters are always immaculate and he likes everything a certain way and becomes very irritable when he doesn't get what he wants. Then, there's his obsession with the details of his wedding, and just watch his interaction with General Martok (and other Klingons) in the later ''Deep Space 9'' seasons. ''(Actually this is not what OCD is at all, more likely to be compulsive repetitive behaviors, but not always. It's worth reading about to educate yourself about this crippling disease)''

[[WMG: The "Orion Syndicate" is actually the '''O'Ryan Syndicate''', a 24th century descendant of the ''Irish Mob'']]
Hence, the reason we never see any actual Orions (the green-skinned humanoids from The Original Series) in episodes that involve the Syndicate, and why humans seem to fill its higher ranks, along with a bunch of other aliens including people from other Federation planets (and non-Fed species like the Yridians). Also explains why the Federation seems so interested in it. It's not an Orion venture at all. It's the O'Ryan Syndicate!
* Is this why they're green? Oh, ''little green men!!!''
** No, it has to be Leprechauns...the Ferengi!

[[WMG: In the Mirror Universe, the Dominion is a democracy.]]
A liberal, Utopian democracy where genetic engineering ensures food for billions of citizens of hundreds of worlds. The Dominion is a powerful trading entity, it exports it genetically engineered supercrops. The Changelings walk freely among the Solids, long ago having defended them against invasion by infiltrating the invaders. There are no Jem'hadar or Vorta, they were never created.
* No, the Vorta and Jem'Hadar still exist, but they're the result of various uplift experiments, rather than go-betweens and cannon fodder. They have full rights.
* In the Mirror Universe, the Changelings have uplifted many, many lower life forms in the Gamma Quadrant to sapient status, and are still worshiped as physical gods by their creations. Genetic engineering is to the Dominion's utopian, liberal democracy what matter replication technology is the Federation in the Prime Universe: the technology that makes Utopia possible. It has defended the Gamma Quadrant from the Borg for at least 2,000 years, and watched the Terran Empire rise and fall from a distance.
* So what was Mirror Odo doing at Mirror Terok Nor?
** He was still sent out by the Founders to explore the galaxy, it just so happens that when he went through the wormhole he found the despotic, autocratic Alliance instead of the (comparatively less-so) Cardassians/Bajorans.
* In fact, a major point of the whole series seems to have been that the Dominion was the complete opposite of the Federation: where humanity used its unique characteristics to bring thousands of species together in racial harmony, the Dominion's founders used their species' unique abilities to conquer and redesign the other species of their quadrant to suit themselves. Where the Federation outlawed genetic tampering and augmentation, the Dominion used it extensively to reshape every species to serve it in some capacity. Since the Dominion is such a complete inversion of the Federation, it's likely that over in the morally inverted Mirror Universe, the Dominion ''is'' the Federation. It probably even calls itself that, or something like it. (The "Gamma Confederation" maybe?)
* {{Jossed}} in the EU novel ''Rise Like Lions''. The Mirror Dominion is in fact ''worse'' than the Prime Dominion. This makes sense, as the Mirror Universe isn't really a moral inversion of the Prime, it's more like an exaggeration of its negative aspects:
** Mirror humanity in general has our selfishness magnified.
** Prime!Kirk's womanizing tendencies and confidence-bordering-on-arrogance get magnified into blatant sexism and AttemptedRape.
** Prime!Sisko's cocky streak takes over his character to where he basically starts the Rebellion because he was bored of being Kira's {{privateer}}.
** The Mirror Klingons and Cardassians have their species' asshole sides exaggerated, and Mirror Worf wasn't raised on human tales of Klingon honor so he's more like a House of Duras-style drunken asshole Klingon.
** Point of order: ''that'' novel does not establish that the Mirror Dominion is worse, merely that it exists and is organized in the same basic way (with ketracel white-dependent Jem'Hadar cannon fodder, Vorta as the organizers/commanders, and the Founders firmly on top). The Mirror Dominion being worse comes from the Decipher Star Trek RPG, although there's nothing contradicting it in the short glimpse shown in ''Rise Like Lions''.

[[WMG:The Federation wanted to start the war w/ Dominion but found themselves outclassed and outgunned when they did.]]
Despite numerous warning from residents of the Gamma Quadrant about the Dominion, Star Fleet kept constantly probing deeper into the Gamma Quadrant and establishing colonies until they provoked the attack that destroyed the USS Odyssey. Then the Federation attempts a poorly planned and executed "peace initiative" that ends in its delegation being captured and "brainwashed" by the Dominion. This failure wasn't followed not by a retreat from the Gamma Quadrant, but a military buildup of Deep Space Nine.

[[WMG: The founders are [[Creator/HPLovecraft Shoggoth]].]]

[[WMG: Odo's forced transformation into humanoid form in "Broken Link" was actually a reversion to the Changelings' ancient form]]
The Female Changeling once told Odo that the Changeling Founders were originally solids who evolved into shapeshifters. In "Broken Link", when Odo is punished by the Founders by being transformed into a humanoid, the Founders merely de-evolved him. That is, they forced him into a "throwback" humanoid form that was already encoded in his genetic material.

[[WMG: The Great Link deliberately sent out the hundred Changeling infants so that they would experience bigotry and isolation.]]
When the Great Link sent out one hundred infant Changelings to live among Alpha Quadrant cultures, it knew they would experience social isolation, if not outright hatred from humanoids. This was a deliberate strategy by the Great Link to ensure that future generations of Changelings shared its disdain and paranoia of "solids", thus ensuring the Dominion's status quo. Had the infants experienced Alpha Quadrant cultures differently -- say, as a collective group rather than isolated individuals, or as visitors with a home among the Great Link rather than stranded orphans -- they wouldn't have cultivated the necessary resentment needed to run a xenophobic empire. However, they didn't expect Odo to turn out the way he did ...
* Laas is pretty much what they imagined the hundred would all be, scorned, condescending, and dismissive of the solids' welfare. Laas wanted to create his own link, if memory serves, so their plan wasn't perfect. What made Odo so special (even if he didn't know it) was that he learned to empathize with the solids and understand their motivations, and was the only Changling to do so.

[[WMG: The Dominion War and Sisko as the Emisary were also part of Q's test and trial of humanity.]]
Q's appearance on [=DS=]9 was not random or as purposeless as we may think, he was checking in on Benjamin Sisko who was a sort of double blind test of humanity. Picard was the human Q chose to make aware of the test, and he put Picard through hoops that Picard knew about to judge humanity that way. The much more meaningful test was Sisko, and by extension the entire Dominion War. Check it - Omnipotent Q introduced the Enterprise to the Borg, the Borg attacked at Wolf 359, Jennifer Sisko was killed at 359, which drove Sisko out of regular duty to be posted at [=DS=]9, where he becomes the emissary and discovers the wormhole starting the war with the Dominion. Whereas Q tested Riker with the physical powers of a god, he tested Sisko with the social/ethical powers of a god by putting Sisko in a position to be worshipped as a god by another race of being, how would humanity handle that? Q tested Picard with the temporal anomaly to see if humanity could grasp a paradox. Sisko had to actually speak to non-linear and learn to communicate with them, was this a test of humanities ability to communicate on a deeper esoteric level? The Dominion was an enemy capable of plunging the peaceful Federation into a loosing war, how would humanity handle that challenge, would they rise to it, would they loose their way?

[[WMG: The Founder masquerading as Bashir murdered the baby Changeling.]]
The infant Changeling dies mysteriously and suddenly in the night while under Bashir's care- at a time when "Bashir" is almost certainly a Founder infiltrator. The show makes it clear fairly early on that the Founder's "No Changeling has ever killed another" philosophy is nonsense, after a different infiltrator attempts to murder Odo aboard the Defiant, and their overall attitude toward their young is almost absurdly neglectful. Founder!Bashir likely killed the baby in order to prevent the Federation from learning more about their race (which of course ended up backfiring entirely).

[[WMG: Why the Dominion War isn't mentioned in the Visitor.]]

Because the war never turned hot. They're still in a very long, uncomfortable cold war with them - without Sisko's input events happened differently. The Dominion is building up forces, possibly already aligned with Cardassia (all though without his rivalry with Sisko Dukat's motivations might have been changed slightly) and the Federation appeases them over and over again ... by the time they stand up to them it might be too late.
* An alternative, more positive, possibility is that without Sisko's involvement, the events of ''To the Death'' happened differently. Weyoun of course painted things as negatively for the Federation as possible, but in The Visitor's timeline, perhaps the events went more favourable for the Alpha Quadrant than that, triggering a civil war between a majority of loyal Jem'Hadar and a much smaller group of renegade Jem'Hadar with access to a functional Iconian gateway and therefore the immensely powerful strategic ability to strike ''anywhere''. By the time that was sorted out, years might have passed (losing Dukat his opportunity to seize control with the Dominion's help, since no Dominion help is forthcoming for the foreseeable future), the Dominion's Gamma Quadrant forces would have been depleted and the gateway might have had to have been destroyed, leaving the Dominion to take decades to build up their forces simply to be where they were by the time of ''To the Death''.