Need help from a DS9 junkie

[Ineti]

Okay folks, I need a hand from someone steeped in DS9 lore.

In the episode "The Die Is Cast," the Obsidian Order and the Tal Shiar send a fleet of 20 warships into the Gamma Quadrant to destroy the Founders' homeworld. Once there, they are ambushed by Jem Hadar fighters. At the end of the episode, Sisko states that there's no reports of survivors or ships that got away.

I haven't seen the episode "In Purgatory's Shadow" yet. I know it's a follow up of sorts to "The Die is Cast."

The encyclopedia states that all 20 ships were destroyed.

My question is, does "In Purgatory's Shadow" clearly state that all 20 ships were destroyed?

I ask because I'm writing a short story about the battle, and the aired episode gives me a little wiggle room as to whether there were surviving ships or not. The story needs only to be based on what was seen on film, not what's stated in books.

Can anyone out there lend a hand?

[Dan Gurden]

I dont recall a lione of dialogue stating that all ships were destroyed. However;

Bad News;
No ships returned except for the Starfleet Runabout with Odo and Garak aboard, and they were watching the systematic picking apart of the fleet on their escape. This would have been a time that the wormhole was being watched very carefully for any survivors with very little unauthorised traffic into the Gamma Quadrant...

Good News;
There were survivors, both Romulan and Cardassian, those who were interred in the Dominion Penal asteroid... Given that the Dominion didn't have a very good record for taking prisoners, especially during space battles... This could imply that lifepods were picked up, or some crew managed to reach a planetary surface where they were over-powered...

Or it could mean a ship got away, and tried to escape after receiving heavy damage only to be captured later, some time in the following 18 months (about the time that we catch up to Enebran Tain in the prison camp)...

Hope that helps

[Capt.Hunter]

Slight correction to the above: The Runabout got wasted too - the Defiant beamed Odo and Garak off it just prior to its destruction.

Although Sisko said no ships survived, the Defiant was hot-tailing it out of Dodge at the time and might not have noticed if, say, a Romulan Warbird managed to cloak and get away. That'd be my best bet if I wanted to run a campaign based around "the one that got away".

[Dan Gurden]

Originally posted by Capt.Hunter
Although Sisko said no ships survived, the Defiant was hot-tailing it out of Dodge at the time and might not have noticed if, say, a Romulan Warbird managed to cloak and get away. That'd be my best bet if I wanted to run a campaign based around "the one that got away".

On further thought, you could probably claim more 'wiggle room' if the escaping vessel was one of the Obsidian Order Keldons...

After all, the changeling infiltrator was among the Romulan command structure, and the Romulans were always aware of the flaws to the Cloaking Device even if they ddin't advertise the flaws...

However it could well be claimed that the field distortion of the Romulan cloaking device on one of the Cardassian Keldon class vessels could help in the vessels escape, while a Warbird (and all its weaknesses) would have been well documented and known by the Dominion through the actions of their infiltrator Colonel Lovok...

YMMV... But its just another option to lay at the table. So I hope it helps with your story.

[Evan van Eyk]

Sorry to correct you but there were no survivors. i do not know the English title of the episode but when Odo returns to the founders and is made human, Garak asks the founder what the Cardassians need to do to return their survivors of this battle home. The Founder simply aks which survivors? and makes clear that there were none.

[Dan Gurden]

Originally posted by Evan van Eyk
Sorry to correct you but there were no survivors. i do not know the English title of the episode but when Odo returns to the founders and is made human, Garak asks the founder what the Cardassians need to do to return their survivors of this battle home. The Founder simply aks which survivors? and makes clear that there were none.

Which was a lie on the founders part... And stated as such when we met the survivors including Enebran Tain during Season 5, in the 2-part episodes;

In Purgatory's Shadow and By Inferno's Light


Now while it can be argued that most of these prisoners were gathered from other raids and combats, the fact that Enebran Tain was there immediatly contradicts what the founder said, and makes a large number of the Cardassian and Romulan prisoners eligable to have been captured in the same place.

The episode you are thinking of is Broken Link the Season 4 finale episode...

[C5]

IIRC, the conversation between Garak and the Founder goes like this :
Garak : Were there any Cardassian survivors ?
Founders : There is no Cardassian survivor anywhere. Cardassia was DEAD the day it stroke against the Dominion.

This is 100% inaccurate , but I think that was the general idea : the Founder answered by anticipating the death of all Cardassians... so this can include some survivors of the Rom/Cardies force.

[Capt.Hunter]

OK, she meant that they were already dead in the sense that those who had been captured would soon die. Makes sense.

But what I'm suggesting is that, if a ship managed to cloak and escape, the Founder leader might not necessarily know about it - with all the debris after that battle, it'd be difficult to tell exactly how many ships it came from. Granted, you could combine the record logs from the Jem'Hadar ships and confirm kills, but the Dominion is a touch arrogant and might make the mistake of simply assuming they got 'em all...

[Ineti]

You guys rock. Thanks a lot for the information and feedback.

It sounds like there's just enough wiggle room to get away with a warbird or a Keldon to have cloaked during the melee and limp away. I'll write the story and submit it. If it gets rejected, so be it.

Thanks again!