| File:Star Trek DS9 - 02 - The Siege.jpg | |
| Author: | Peter David |
| Publisher: | Pocket Books |
| Series: | Pocket DS9 #2 |
| Published: | 1 May 1993 |
| Pages: | 272 |
| Year: | 2369 |
| Reference #: | ISBN 0671870831 |
Death prowls the passageways of Deep Space 9. -- A murderer strikes on DS9, which brings a hostile Cardassian task force to the station.
Summary
- From the book jacket
- When Deep Space 9™ is forced to curtail entry to the wormhole due to increased graviton emissions, an air of biting tension settles over the station. But when this anxiety leads to the murder of an Edeman religious leader, Commander Benjamin Sisko and Security Chief Odo realize they face a larger problem.
- The missionary is only the first to die, soon Sisko and Odo have more lifeless bodies on their hands and a killer who strikes without motive. Then, both the Edemans and Cardassians arrive threatening to destroy the station unless the murderer is given to them for retribution. Now in order to save Deep Space Nine and stop the killing, Odo must try to destroy a powerful assassin who is the only link to his mysterious past.
- Excerpts of copyrighted sources are included for review purposes only, without any intention of infringement.
Chapter Two
The Bajoran wormhole is emitting a high flux of neutrinos that is getting progressively higher. This phenomenon begins leading the command staff to worry about the wormhole's possible collapse. This instability causes Sisko to order the wormhole closed to traffic.
Chapter Five
Dr. Bashir examines the son of the Edemian spiritual leader Mas Marko shortly before an Edemian missionary is killed in his quarters.
Chapter Nine
A Cardassian envoy is murdered while attempting to sexually assault a former acquaintance.
Chapter Ten
After the murders of their representatives, both Mas Marko, of the Edemians, and Gul Dukat, of the Cardassian Union, demand the extradition of the murderer once caught. Dukat threatens to destroy the station. Dr. Bashir is assaulted by Marko for demanding to treat his son's medical condition. A Bajoran dockworker is the murderer's latest victim.
Chapter Twenty
Odo and Meta fight it out in the vastness of space.
Background
This is the first official novel in the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine novels.
Despite the identical title, this novel bears no relation to the second-season episode "The Siege."
This novel takes place a month after the events of "A Man Alone."
Characters
- Canon characters listed below are linked to the main article about them. Non-canon characters are not linked, but those that recurred, appearing or being mentioned in more than one story, are defined further in Pocket DS9 characters.
Regular and recurring characters
- Benjamin Sisko
- Starfleet commander, the CO of Deep Space 9. At Starfleet Academy, Sisko's claimed his nickname was "Dead-Eye", due to his proficiency with a phaser.
- Kira Nerys
- Bajoran Militia major, liason and XO of DS9.
- Quark
- Jake Sisko
- Julian Bashir
- Miles O'Brien
- Starfleet chief of operations on DS9.
- Jadzia Dax
- This novel claims that Dax hadn't been a female "for over eighty years" prior to being joined with Jadzia.
- Odo
- Odo says he's been living among Bajorans for "half a century."
- Institutes a procedure of medical scans to screen for the shapeshifter Meta. Blood screenings would be used in the episode "Homefront."
- Keiko O'Brien
- Molly O'Brien
- Daughter of Miles and Keiko, Molly celebrates her third birthday at the end of this novel.
- Dukat
- Nog
- Poured a coolant and gelatin mixture out of ceiling plate as a joke while security was searching for the shapeshifting murderer.
- Rom
Other characters
- Mas Marko
- Mas Marko was the premier spiritual leader of the Edema system. He claimed to be doing the work of the holy K'olkr and was not pleased when denied entry into the wormhole, but relented when showed proof of the destructive capability of the wormhole's subspace compression. Marko stayed on the station with his wife Azira, his son Rasa, and two retainers, Del and Lobb, until passage was again possible. He was nearly seven feet tall and had a very deep voice. Marko's retainers always walked behind him, never in front of him.
- Soon after arriving on Deep Space Nine, Mas Marko set up a booth hoping to spread the word of the Edemian deity K'olkr. After learning of his wife's consent to have their son's illness treated, he divorced her then excommunicated her from the planet Edema.
- Azira
- Azira was the wife of Mas Marko, mother of Rasa, and daughter to Eweeun and Kragar. Mas Marko allowed Commander Sisko to address her as Azira. Although initially refusing to have her son's illness treated, she relents when shown a holographic simulation of the disease's effects. Because she allowed Dr. Bashir to interfere in Rasa's fate, Marko divorced Azira and excommunicated her from their homeworld.
- Rasa
- Rasa was the son of Mas Marko and Azira, roughly ten Earth years in age. Sisko thought he appeared sickly and ordered Dr. Bashir to examine him. Bashir diagnosed the boy with having panoria and eventually treated him despite his parents' religious objections. Rasa was believed by his father to be tainted after his treatment and exiled from Edema.
- Meta
- A shapeshifter hired by the Ferengi Glav, this being had the same abilities as Odo. He savagely murdered an Edemian missionary, a Cardassian envoy, a Bajoran dockworker, one of Bashir's nurses, and ultimately Glav himself, before attempting to kill his intended target, Quark. Meta claimed that watching people die made him more appreciative of life. The shapeshifter was pulled into the Bajoran wormhole during its period of subspace compression, where his body was separated into its compnoent molecules. His consciousness remained intact but his body was unable to rejoin, resulting in a kind of limbo.
- Glav
- A Ferengi associate of Quark. He had a triangular brown spot on his eye ridge and spoke in a low drawl. Quark sabotaged a major investment deal for Glav by offering material for a lower price. This drove Glav into near bankruptcy, save for some seemingly worthless property on planet Xerxes Six which yielded a massive deposit of calvinum. Glav's sale of the rare calvinum to the Byfrexians made him very wealthy. With his debts repaid, Glav traveled to Deep Space Nine with Meta, a psychopathic shapeshifter, to exact revenge on Quark. Ironically, Glav was the final person Meta murdered.
- Chafin
- Lieutenant Chafin was a relief science officer in Ops.
- Lieutenant Chafin is likely a reference to sci-fi fan T. Alan Chafin.
- Del
- Del was one of Mas Marko's retainers.
- Lobb
- Lobb was one of Mas Marko's retainers who was new to Edemian missionary work. His manner was somewhat less formal than his colleague, Del, even offering to shake hands with Commander Sisko instead of bowing in deference. Lobb was savagely killed by a mysterious shapeshifter. His first cousin was Mencar.
- Gotto Lon
- Gotto Lon was a Cardassian envoy for Gul Dukat. He visited Deep Space Nine on Dukat's behalf as a reminder of his commander's presence. Gotto attempted to bribe Quark into spying on station goings-on for the Cardassian government. However, he was killed by the shapeshifter calling itself Meta shortly afterward.
- Meyer
- Meyer was a Starfleet security officer assigned to Deep Space Nine.
- Boyajian
- Boyajian was a Starfleet security officer assigned to Deep Space Nine.
- Boyajian previously appeared in Peter David's novels, Strike Zone and Vendetta as a security officer aboard the USS Enterprise-D. The character also appeared in the New Frontier novels, Once Burned and The Two-Front War as a security officer aboard the USS Grissom and USS Excalibur, respectively.
- Tang
- Tang was a Starfleet security officer assigned to Deep Space Nine. Tang previously appeared, as a sergeant on Betazed, in "Imzadi".
- Dina
- Dina was a nine-year old Bajoran girl and the daughter of Bena. She was a regular pupil at Keiko's school on Deep Space Nine.
- Bena
- Bena was an umarried Bajoran woman who worked heavy loaders in the docking ring of Deep Space Nine. She was previously a day worker in the mines. Her daughter was Dina and they lived in the habitat ring on level five, corridor 39-A. During the Bajoran occupation, Bena was the comfort woman of Gotto Lon.
- Carstairs
- Carstairs was a Starfleet security officer assigned to Deep Space Nine.
- Hicks
- Hicks was a Starfleet security officer assigned to Deep Space Nine.
- Kelsi
- Kelsi was a Bajoran woman of advanced years who was the senior traffic manager in the cargo bay area. Kelsi had a remarkable gift for locating items without use of computer logs. No one on the station knew her last name and rumor had it she predated the building of the station. She was the third murder victim of the shapeshifter Meta in the cargo bay on level 22.
- Latasa
- Latasa was the nurse assisting Dr. Bashir as he investigated the death of Bajoran dockworker Kelsi. She was the fourth murder victim of the shapeshifter known as Meta.
- Ayvon of the Seven
- Ayvon of the Seven was a noted freedom fighter in Bajoran history who was the source of many quotable sayings.
- Sentor
- Sentor was referred to as the Cardassian tactical officer aboard the Ravage.
References
USS Enterprise NCC-1701-D, Ten Forward, gold-pressed latinum, Ferengi, Ops, Trill, Bajoran wormhole, Gamma Quadrant, Quark's, Borg, USS Saratoga, Garak, I'danian spice pudding, synthale, Earth, aphasia virus, Prime Directive, infirmary, runabout, Tosk, Klingons, Ibudan, Romulan Neutral Zone, Dabo, Mugato, isolinear chip, Worf, tractor beam, inertial damping field, Albert Einstein
- Abbott and Costello
- Abbott and Costello were a comedy team from Earth that starred in a number of films from 1940 to 1956. Miles told Keiko about the comedy team, which she considered to be an archaic reference.
- Amorphous
- Amorphous is the shaper of Ferengi dreams of avarice. In Ferengi culture, lying in the name of Amorphous is "simply not done."
- atmosphere regulator
- An atmosphere regulator is a subsystem of Deep Space Nine's life support system. O'Brien hadn't yet converted them from Cardassian standards.
- Boffin
- The Boffin are an alien race. A Boffin was a traveler en route to the Gamma Quadrant.
- This may be a reference to the hobbit ancestors of the Baggins family in J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings.
- Boja
- Boja is a game of chance at Quark's bar.
- Byfrexians
- Byfrexians are an alien race who value calvinum and will willingly pay "an arm and a leg" for a single gram.
- The Byfrexians also figure into Peter David's novel, Imzadi.
- calvinum
- Calvinum is a rare substance used by the Byfrexians to power their ship engines. Glav sold his entire supply for two million bars of gold-pressed latinum.
- cellular scanner
- A cellular scanner is a piece of medical equipment used to analyze tissue samples. Also refrerred to as a bioscanner.
- Dantus Three
- Dantus Three is a world covered in a thick, permeating fog. This requires the denizens of the planet to communicate entirely through the sense of touch.
- panoria
- Panoria is a terminal medical condition unique to Edemians and two other unspecified alien races. Approximately three percent of Edemians are susceptible to this viral disease, which gradually shuts down all metabolic processes if left untreated. Symptoms include elevated pulse rate, nausea, fever, and body aches. It is treated with tricyclidine.
- Ravage
- The Cardassian warship Ravage was part of the Second Order commanded by Gul Dukat. The Galor-class vessel reportedly had enough armaments to knock a Class-G star out of position. Dukat used the ship to demand the release of his aide's murderer into Cardassian custody.
- Xerxes Six
- Xerxes Six is a planet where Glav lived for a time on some property he owned there. He eventually discovered a deposit of calvinum that he later sold to become quite wealthy.
- XXX-Three
- XXX-Three was a holosuite program featuring Major Kira and Lieutenant Dax as dancing girls. Bashir blackmailed Quark into erasing it.
- This novel was written before the episode "Meridian" when Quark would try to create a holo-program of Kira for the first time.
- XXX-Four
- XXX-Four was a holosuite program featuring a fog-filled room and laughing women. This program was initiated by Quark in an attempt to confuse his would-be murderer.
- Zealous
- The Edemian vessel of Holy War Zealous was summoned by Mas Marko to force Sisko to release the murderer of Marko's retainer into their custody. The vessel's commander was Mencar. The Zealous was armed with disruptor banks.
- zot
- Zot is a curse word in the Ferengi language.
- Internet
- Bashir mentions seeing news about the impending Borg attack on the internet.
- Elvis Presley
- According to Keiko, Miles had insisted on naming their first child Elvis if it had been a boy.
- This is a reference to Colm Meaney's character in the film, The Commitments, who regarded Elvis Presley more highly than the Pope. This conflicts with information in TNG: "Disaster", where he wants the boy's name to be Michael.
- Tellarites
- A Tellarite was a patron at Quark's while another was a traveler en route to the Gamma Quadrant.
- tri-esta
- The tri-esta was a unit of money, in coin form, used by the Ferengi.
- This may the name of the coin seen in DS9: "The Nagus."
- subspace compression
- In the novel, Dax described this phenomenon as space naturally closing rips in its "fabric," like wormholes.
- Edema system
- The Edema system is the home star system of the Edemians and a long way from Deep Space Nine.
- Edemians
- Edemians are humanoids from the Edema system. Their skin is usually a shiny ebony while their eyes are a gleaming red. Bashir regarded them as a fairly hardy race. Edemians follow a set of rules called Siilar that help them live life in accordance with their deity, K'olkr. Upon death, a funeral must be held on Edema within twelve hours in order for the soul to be with the deity K'olkr.
- K'olkr
- K'olkr is the winged deity worshipped by the Edemians. He is believed to live on a planet called The Sparkling World and that those worthy are sent by him on a journey toward cosmic oneness. Those whose confidence in K'olkr wavered are instead sent to a nether realm called E'bon where pain and punishment awaited. Torture in E'bon lasts until the soul is blackened and flayed, then it is sent back to begin a new incarnation with the spiritual knowledge of their torment.
- K'olkr is a reference to sci-fi fan Rich Kolker.
- Ferengi Bureau of Audit
- The Ferengi Bureau of Audit is an agency in the Ferengi government that audits the assets of Ferengi citizens.
- This novel was written before the establishment of the Ferengi Commerce Authority in "Family Business", though it is possible that the Ferengi Bureau of Audit could be an arm of the FCA.
- Orions
- An Orion was a customer at Quark's and was rather irritated with his beverage. A dissatisfied Orion once caused extensive damage to Quark's bar.
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