posted
Once again, Bernd and J�rg produce quality analysis of DVD material, this time on a DS9 transport design.
The excellent article raises a few questions.
1) Since the same model is seen in two orientations, are we perhaps witnessing a second case of "freighter docks to DS9 upside down", giving a weird sort of support for the decision to show the Sydney model dock in that orientation, too? This could actually be the third case if we say the Valerian and Boslic freighters are "really" Talarian warships converted and flipped, rather than just looking like that... It would be interesting to devise a plausible reason for such a docking choice. Perhaps half of the DS9 docking ring (along with every second airlock) is really built upside down?
(Of course, it may be that these ships were upside down in all their OTHER appearances. In those, they tend to be seen in empty space, with at most another starship nearby but not docked. Even the Jenolan could have crashed on her roof, and might have been designed to have her bridge at the lowermost of her decks. We never saw the nacelle registries up close...)
2) Since the ship is seen in Bajoran hands in several episodes, including as an "old" Bajoran vessel very probably predating the Wadi contact, would it be possible to claim that it indeed is a Bajoran design in ALL of its appearances? As the authors point out, it shares some prominent components with another Bajoran freighter design, not to mention the general triangular shape.
The cheapskate Trills could easily be flying aboard Bajoran ships, but not so easily buying ships from Bajorans who likely have had little or no shipbuilding industry in the recent past. And the Bajorans probably weren't buying anything from the generally UFP-minded Trills during the Cardassian occupation when the "old" ship from "Indiscretion" most likely was purchased.
Perhaps a better bet would be to say that all three triangular freighters seen docking with DS9 are actually Cardassian designs, antiquated enough to be left behind in some quantity after the Occupation. This would also easily explain how the Cardie-minded Xepolites came to possess some.
Alternately, the three designs are ancient Bajoran ones, and it was the Cardassians who pilfered them and sold them forward to Xepolites. Bajorans could quite justifiably have been flying these ships for several thousands of years, explaining how some of came to be operated as far away as Delta Quadrant! Granted, the "Explorers" lightsail being from only 800 years prior muddles that timeline quite a bit...
The missing piece here is the Wadi. Yes, the ship is first seen in Wadi hands. But the Wadi have already made contact with the Feds at that point: the meeting with Sisko is just some sort of a "second contact", as we hear the gamesters were first met by Vulcans. We could downgrade that to "third contact" quite easily: Vulcans meet Wadi, Vulcans call for Bajoran transport to pick up Wadi, Wadi sail to DS9, Wadi play their games, Wadi again depart on a Bajoran ship which later returns to Bajor. No major problem there.
...Except that the Wadi had this elaborate game machinery set up aboard the ship. Slightly odd, if the ship was Bajoran. Does the dialogue from "Move Along Home" solidly establish that it wasn't just something the Wadi smuggled aboard into one Bajoran cabin, though? Something not much bigger than DaiMon Bok's fantasy ball from "The Battle", or the actual gameboard we saw at Quark's?
Generally speaking, Bajorans might be happy to provide a vessel for some length of time to these first "first contactees" the planet has received after the Occupation. There would be a Bajoran operating crew aboard, of course - or at least a crew hired by the provisional government - but we need not hear of their existence during the episode.
3) What IS that common piece of machinery on the "hammerhead" ship and the "Wadi" ship? I'd suggest a warp nacelle... Since the "Wadi" ship has two to the "hammerhead's" one, it's only natural that she'd be faster - perhaps even the sort of hot rod that the Xepolites would further tune to create Star Trek's answer to the Millennium Falcon.
4) The fact that the ship so exactly fits into Terok Nor may not be a coincidence. Either these are standard Cardassian dimensions, or then Terok Nor was built to accommodate easily available standard Bajoran ships.
5) I just have to say that the design is tres cool. And with pretty hull art! (Hmm. Those seem a bit like SW Republic colors...) There are many Defiant elements there, dovetailing with the warship design's known freighter origins. In our universe, that is, not in the Trek one. But all this would also tie the design to the "Profit and Loss" Cardassian freighter that became the Hideki class, providing more fodder for the "single originating culture" theory.
posted
Since these ships were all used to dock with DS9, they may be some kind of Bajoran standard small transport. I'm really bad in details like this, but was the Trill ship really said to be a owned by the Trill? Is there a possibility that it was just a random (ie. Bajoran) transport ship?
I vaguely remember some scenes onboard the Wadi ship. I think it looked normal enough to be a Bajoran transport on loan.
posted
It is a good idea that in all of its appearances we could have seen the very same or closely related designs. Unless it was mentioned somewhere in "Move Along Home" that it was indeed "their ship", referring to the Wadi.
The Xepolite freighter could be a closely related design where only the engines differ. We may simply re-interpret the visual evidence because there is no up and down in space without a reference, as opposed to ships docking upside down with the station. Or it is something totally different (considering it appears to be more advanced too). I think it is a matter of preference.
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