Michael Eddington

Species:	Human
Affiliation:	Maquis (formerly Federation Starfleet)
Rank:	Lieutenant Commander
Occupation:	Former security officer
Status:	KIA (2373)
Died:	2373
Spouse(s):	Rebecca Sullivan (widowed)
Played by:	Kenneth Marshall

"I called him a traitor once, but in a way, he was the most loyal man I ever met. He was a Maquis, right up to the bitter end."

– Benjamin Sisko, 2373 ("Blaze of Glory")

Michael Eddington was a Starfleet security officer assigned to station Deep Space 9. Eddington became disillusioned with Starfleet and the Federation, and joined the Maquis, becoming a leading member. Eddington was captured, but was later killed during a special operation while serving his sentence. Eddington was of Canadian descent.

Starfleet career

Eddington was stationed to DS9 in 2371 as the station's Chief of Starfleet security after first contact with the Dominion. This was done in part to increase Starfleet control of the station's security operations, as Starfleet did not have full confidence in the current security chief, Odo. (DS9: "The Search, Part I")

In the simulation created by the Founders, Eddington was presented as a tool of Admiral Nechayev, rigidly enforcing the terms of the treaty between the Federation and the Dominion, against the will of the Deep Space 9 senior staff.

Odo and Eddington worked closely from that point on, coordinating security operations aboard the station. When Commander Sisko defied the direct orders of Admiral Toddman not to pursue the joint Tal Shiar-Obsidian Order fleet on their mission to destroy the Founders, Eddington was ordered to sabotage the USS Defiant's cloaking device, a mission he completed. However, Eddington was not relieved of duty, as he assured Sisko that he had been issued no further orders from Toddman, and intended to fulfill his duty to the commander. (DS9: "The Die is Cast")

On a mission to patrol the Tzenkethi border, Eddington was assigned by Captain Sisko to be the personal guard for Ambassador Krajensky. It was subsequently learned that Krajensky had been replaced by a Changeling infiltrator. Eddington began an initial security sweep of the Defiant, but the whereabouts of the shapeshifter remained unknown. Eddington also participated in the armed search of the ship, where the infiltrator was encountered by Sisko, who was wounded in the brief struggle. and it was revealed that blood tests could reveal who was a changeling. Blood tests of the crew were ordered, and one sample appeared to show that Eddington was a Changeling as well. Eddington was to be placed into custody, but the test was proven to be false when it was determined that the Changeling had impersonated Doctor Bashir and administered the screening test itself, when the real Bashir attempted to burst out of a set of quarters he was apparently locked in. (DS9: "The Adversary")

Eddington assisted Dr. Lenara Kahn of the Trill Science Ministry with her efforts to create an artificial wormhole. During the failed second phase of the experiment, Eddington was wounded in an explosion and fire that occurred following a plasma leak in main engineering aboard the Defiant, but he managed to save another injured crewman. Eddington could not reach Dr. Kahn, who was soon retrieved by Lt. Commander Dax. (DS9: "Rejoined")

In 2372, Eddington was left in command of the station when Captain Sisko, Major Kira, Lt. Commander Dax, Chief O'Brien and Lt. Commander Worf were absent. Upon their return, the runabout Orinoco was sabotaged by the True Way organization and destroyed. However, the patterns of the five officers were stored in the transporter buffer through quick action taken by Eddington, who wiped all computer memory to create the space necessary to store such a complex set of information. In order to maintain their integrity, the computer deactivated all non-vital systems, and stored the patterns in the holosuite, where they appeared in the secret agent program being run by Julian Bashir and Elim Garak at the time. Eddington assisted Odo, Quark and Rom in successfully rematerializing the five officers, despite the complicated and poor maintenance of the holosuites in Quark's. (DS9: "Our Man Bashir")

Several weeks later, Eddington was on leave from Deep Space 9 and Worf temporarily commanded the Starfleet Security detachment while he was gone. (DS9: "Crossfire")

Life with the Maquis

File:Maquis Raider 2373.jpg

Eddington's Maquis raider

In late-2372, Eddington defected to the Maquis by using his position within Starfleet to hijack a shipment of class-four industrial replicators headed to the Cardassian Union from the Federation. He diverted the attention of Captain Sisko by raising suspicions about the business activities of Kasidy Yates, who was involved in supplying the Maquis with non-military supplies during meetings in the Badlands. Sisko led the Defiant into the Badlands personally to arrest Yates. Aboard Deep Space 9, Eddington incapacitated Major Kira, and covertly assumed temporary command of the station with falsified orders from Starfleet Command. He organized a detachment of Starfleet security officers who were to perform their tasks without the assistance of the Bajoran security force. The replicators were transferred aboard a Vulcan freighter which was in Maquis service, and Eddington placed Lieutenant Reese in temporary command of the station. By the time the Defiant returned, Eddington and the replicators had disappeared into Maquis territory. (DS9: "For the Cause")

By 2373, Eddington had risen to become an important leader of the Maquis rebels in the Demilitarized Zone, and Starfleet continued to search for his whereabouts. Captain Sisko arranged to meet with an informant named Cing'ta at a Maquis settlement on Marva IV to acquire information on Eddington. However, the Maquis were able to uncover the activities of Cing'ta, and Eddington had him marooned on an inhospitable planet in the Badlands. Eddington then confronted Sisko on the surface and attempted to communicate the demands of the Maquis to be granted recognized autonomy, to no avail. Upon returning to his raider, Eddington initiated an attack on the Defiant that inflicted heavy damage because vital systems were disabled by a latent computer virus that Eddington had installed before his defection. Similar viruses were located aboard Deep Space 9 and deactivated by Odo. Following this incident, Starfleet opted to remove Captain Sisko from the mission to capture Eddington, and assigned it to Captain Sanders of the USS Malinche instead.

File:Eddingtonandrebecca.jpg

Michael Eddington and Rebecca Sullivan on Athos IV in 2373

At relatively the same time as these events were transpiring, two Bolian freighters carrying several thousand tons of selenium and rhodium nitrite were reported missing near the Badlands. With some chemical restructuring, these two substances could be used to create cobalt diselenide, a nerve agent that is harmless to most humanoids but deadly to Cardassians. Eddington initiated a biogenic weapon campaign to poison the atmospheres of all Cardassian colonies in the Demilitarized Zone, succeeding in doing so at his initial target, Veloz Prime. He was also responsible for an attack against the Malinche that left it adrift. The Defiant returned to the chase and pursued the Maquis, and accurately predicted the next targeted Cardassian colony, Quatal Prime, which Eddington attacked instead of a more logical raid on Panora. The Defiant arrived at the location too late; the cobalt diselenide devices had already been detonated in the atmosphere. Eddington disabled a fleeing Cardassian transport, and this action forced Sisko to look to the aid of the Cardassians before he could pursue the fleeing Maquis. Sisko, determined to prevent the destruction of further Cardassian colonies, detonated a trilithium resin device within the atmosphere of the Maquis colony on Solosos III, and threatened to perform the same action on every Maquis colony in the Demilitarized Zone. In order to spare the other Maquis worlds, Eddington turned over the remaining biogenic weapons and surrendered to Starfleet for court martial. (DS9: "For the Uniform")

When Starfleet uncovered communiques indicating that the Maquis had initiated a devastating attack against Cardassia shortly before the organization was destroyed by the Dominion, he was released into the care of Captain Sisko. The two men journeyed to the small planetoid of Athos IV in the Badlands, the supposed launch site of the missiles. It was learned that the attack was a ruse engineered to allow Eddington to rescue the survivors of the Maquis, but the Dominion had previously uncovered the location. The Jem'Hadar had located the base and captured it, inflicting significant casualties on the Maquis survivors. A dozen prisoners were kept under surveillance, but Sisko and Eddington were able to gain entrance to their cell and liberate these few survivors. Included among the prisoners was Rebecca Sullivan, the wife of Eddington whom he had married two weeks before his capture. Unfortunately, the couple were once again sundered, as he was killed by Jem'Hadar soldiers while covering the escape of Sisko and the other survivors. The last thing he did before he died was call out his wife's name. (DS9: "Blaze of Glory")

Interests

Eddington was particularly fond of the novel Les Misérables. He saw himself as the hero, Valjean, pursued by the inflexible policeman Javert, whom Eddington envisioned as his former commander, Benjamin Sisko. (DS9: "For the Uniform")

Eddington had a valued family heirloom in the form of a Canadian one dollar coin he called his "lucky looney", which had been in his family for over two hundred years. (DS9: "Blaze of Glory")

Appendices

Appearances

• DS9:
  • "The Search, Part I" (Season Three)
  • "The Search, Part II" (simulation only)
  • "The Die is Cast"
  • "The Adversary"
  • "Rejoined" (Season Four)
  • "Our Man Bashir"
  • "For the Cause"
  • "For the Uniform" (Season Five)
  • "Blaze of Glory"

Background information

At least part of the motive behind the invention of the Eddington character was that the writing staff of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine wanted to create a Starfleet officer to fill in as a regular character, for whenever Miles O'Brien actor Colm Meaney left to do a film and thereby necessitated the omission of O'Brien. Ronald D. Moore named the character after Paul Eddington, a role played by Kirk Douglas in the 1965 film In Harm's Way. Douglas' character is one of the heroes of the movie, but is an extremely unpleasant individual. Moore later remembered, "For some reason, I thought, 'Yeah, that's Eddington.' It just created a tone in my head." (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Companion, p. 160) According to Moore, Eddington's character was not developed initially with a Maquis affiliation in mind. (AOL chat, 1997) "When we created Eddington," recollected Ira Steven Behr, "we wanted Joe Professional on the station. He didn't have to be a villain, he was just another professional who didn't have to be a nice guy." (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Companion, p. 253) Behr elaborated, "Eddington was supposed to be a benign adversary for Odo. He was supposed to be the greatest security officer that Starfleet had, and he was going to step on Odo's toes." (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Companion, p. 340)

Eddington was played by actor Kenneth Marshall. He was delighted with how the character is first depicted, in DS9 Season 3 premiere "The Search, Part I". "[Director] Kim Friedman took great care in introducing the character," he enthused. "She was very specific about how Eddington should handle himself with the crew." For instance, Friedman advised Marshall not to act in an unfriendly way towards Odo, as "the fact that he was there was threatening enough." (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Companion, p. 164)

On Eddington's actions in "The Die is Cast", Kenneth Marshall commented, "[Eddington] was doing what he felt was right. He was following orders. This is a place where Eddington can grow as a character. Sisko, Kira, Dax and the rest have been together for years; they're a unit. If the rules have to be bent, they'll bend them – they know what they have to do to get a job done. But Eddington comes from the outside and is used to having things done a certain way. He's less inclined to take things into his own hands; he prefers to go by the book. That's a good source of conflict. After 'The Die is Cast', we weren't sure where they were going to take my character. Were they going to give me a chance to redeem myself in future episodes? Or would I continue to be a problem?" (The Official Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Magazine Vol. 15)

In light of Eddington's actions in such episodes as "The Die is Cast" and "The Adversary", Kenneth Marshall was starting to get a sense of the character's rebellious nature. Marshall observed, "The way Eddington is written always presents the idea that he's a threat in some way [....] Eddington has been trained to take command eventually. I think he's a natural commander, like an actor who can play Hamlet but doesn't have the box-office name, so he plays Horatio. But he's going to be the best damned Horatio you ever saw." (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Companion, p. 253)

While directing "The Adversary", Alexander Singer deliberately emphasized Kenneth Marshall's performance as Eddington, due to the character playing a major part in the story. "It was obvious that he should be covered with close-ups," recalled Singer. "Beyond this episode I couldn't say, but for the course of this show, I treated him like a regular member of the cast." (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Companion, p. 252)

Though Eddington had been invented in an effort to provide some competition and conflict for Odo, Ira Steven Behr found that, by the time of "The Adversary", Eddington was seeming too similar to Odo and that their similarities were constricting them both. While Behr and the other DS9 internal writers were writing the script for "The Adversary", they discovered they could take the Eddington character in a new direction. The writers took their cue from a scene in "The Adversary" wherein, although Eddington admits he joined Starfleet with the ambition of becoming a captain, he implies he won't have a chance to realize that hope. "We started to see more about him," recalled Ira Behr. "What if this guy who we originally conceived to be as true blue as possible suddenly realizes that there's something better out there?" Thus, Behr and the other DS9 staff writers began to think of Eddington as a character whose loyalty, at some point, was torn between his Starfleet aspirations and something else. (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Companion, pp. 340-341)

Although "The Adversary" shows Eddington was misidentified as a Changeling, public opinion nevertheless became wary that he was a member of that species, to the puzzlement of the DS9 staff writers. Stated Ira Behr, "After 'The Adversary', everyone on the Internet was convinced that Eddington was a changeling, even though we went out of our way to show that he wasn't. We all looked at each other and said, 'There's no way this guy is ever gonna be a changeling!'" Behr laughed. "We said, 'Let's make him a Maquis.'" (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Companion, p. 253)

During the development of DS9 Season 4 installment "For the Cause", it was Ronald D. Moore who suggested establishing Eddington as the new leader of the Maquis, fulfilling the spark of an idea the writers had concocted while scripting "The Adversary". "We took the character to the point where he's capable of doing questionable things to achieve some greater morality," observed Ira Behr. (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Companion, pp. 340 & 341) Due to the mistaken belief that Eddington was a Changeling, Behr hoped that, when he was eventually revealed as a member of the Maquis in "For the Cause", the notion of Eddington being a shapeshifter, an idea which severely frustrated Behr, would finally be put to rest. (Captains' Logs Supplemental - The Unauthorized Guide to the New Trek Voyages, p. 119) However, Behr also stated, "It seemed to us that people would expect that [Eddington was a Maquis]." (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Companion, p. 339)

An attempt to take Eddington full circle from the events of "For the Cause" was made in DS9 Season 5 outing "For the Uniform"; whereas the former episode culminates in him escaping from DS9, the latter episode ends with him entering custody aboard the space station. (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Companion, p. 418)

The use of Les Misérables in "For the Uniform" provided some convenient dramatic shorthand in establishing Eddington's personality. (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Companion, p. 418) Kenneth Marshall found it appropriate that Eddington saw himself as Jean Valjean, commenting, "It showed that Eddington's obviously well read. He was a thinker and like Sisko said, a romantic." ("Marshall Decree", Dreamwatch issue 37) Another classical influence on how the character is portrayed in "For the Uniform" was Robin Hood or, more precisely, a scene in the 1938 film The Adventures of Robin Hood, in which Robin takes Maid Marian to see masses of starving sufferers. This is very similar to when, in "For the Uniform", Eddington forces Captain Sisko to observe the hungry, run-down Maquis. (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Companion, pp. 418-419)

For a long time before the writing of fifth season two-parter "In Purgatory's Shadow" and "By Inferno's Light", Eddington was imagined as being featured in an ultimately abandoned DS9 story, "with him in the brig and showing how he breaks out," Ira Behr stated. The writing staff intended to compel the audience into rooting for Eddington as the installment progressed, though the idea was eventually dropped because the writers, admitted Behr, "weren't confident that the fans were really behind the character." (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Companion, p. 422)

Kenneth Marshall considers Eddington's Maquis arc to show that the character was "duplicitous but not diabolical. He did what he did for a cause he believed in. He had to be clever because of the nature of what he was doing, but it wasn't with malice. Down through history, there are lots of people who became misguided in their zeal for their causes, but in many cases their original motives weren't malicious." ("Marshall Decree", Dreamwatch issue 37)

Eddington's relationship with Captain Sisko was enjoyable for Kenneth Marshall. "I loved working with Avery Brooks and the way Eddington brought out this dark side to Sisko," the actor said. "In many ways they're flip sides to the same coin. After all, how many times has Sisko broken the rules to do what's right? It gave the audience a chance to see them both in different terms." ("Marshall Decree", Dreamwatch issue 37) Indeed, the DS9 writing staff thought of Eddington, he having found his allegiance divided, as "a farther side of Sisko." (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Companion, p. 341)

After Eddington's final appearance in "Blaze of Glory", many fans were not sure how morally righteous he had been. This degree of uncertainty was even shared by Ira Steven Behr, who conceded, "I still haven't figured him out. Do we like him? Do you not like him? Was he good? Bad? I'm not sure." (Star Trek: The Official Starships Collection, issue 28, p. 17)

Even though Eddington dies in "Blaze of Glory", Kenneth Marshall hoped, due to having been pleased to play the character, that he might get a chance to return. He remarked, "You could say I'm still in denial. I'll never give up hope. After all, we know how incredible medical science is on Star Trek, they wave these little things over parts of your body and you're healed. I can think of three or four ways they could get around Eddington being shot, but the producers and writers will decide what they choose to do. I enjoyed playing this character, especially now that they've fleshed him out so much. Heck, he was just given a wife, and we didn't get much time to develop that angle." ("Marshall Decree", Dreamwatch issue 37)

Apocrypha

Eddington appeared in the novel Time's Enemy. Alternate versions of Eddington appear in the comic "The Looking Glass War" and the novel "A Gutted World" in Echoes and Refractions.

Eddington's mirror universe counterpart was depicted as a senior member of the Terran Rebellion in the novels Saturn's Children, Fearful Symmetry, The Soul Key and Rise Like Lions.

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