Flare Sci-Fi Forums: The Mirror Gamma Quad

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Posted by Aban Rune (Member # 226) on :

This is about the mirror universe in general so I put it here instead of the DS9 forum.

The one vital piece of info left out in the DS9 crew's many visits to the mirror universe was the Mirror Gamma Quadrant. In their first visit, Kira mentioned that they didn't know about the wormhole. But after seeing the runabout go through, you'd think they'd have figured it out.

I want to see what the Dominion and the Jem'Hadar are like in the mirror universe. My guess would be that the Founders are like a big group of holy men dedicated to bringing peace to the Galaxy and that the Jem'Hadar are like pointy headed candy stripers. Hmm, maybe this is why we never saw this aspect of the mirror universe.

What do you guys and gals think about the mirror Gamma?

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"Resolve and thou art free."

Posted by Mucus (Member # 24) on :

I forget, did they ever find the wormhole in the "Mirror" universe?
For that matter, if it does exist, are the Pah Wraths and Prophets flipped?
And what are the Borg like?

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No I'm Spartacus!

Posted by Kosh (Member # 167) on :

I wonder if the Dominion would have help the Humans defeat the Alliance. I have wondered about that often.

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Fool of a Took, throw yourself in next time!!
Gandalf

Posted by KXZ (Member # 119) on :

I had always wished that they would have gone into the mirror Gamma Quadrant. Maybe the Dominion is just like the Federation in the normal universe.

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All hands, abandon ship! All hand, abandon...
BOOM!

Posted by deadcujo (Member # 13) on :

It would be nice if the Jem'Hadar were dominant in the
Gamma quadrant, and free of the Founders.

In my version, the Borg are the same, except they are pink.

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The Unknown Vulcan
http://www.phix-it.com/~perseus/

Posted by Saltah'na (Member # 33) on :

Note that both universes are similar until certain points in the TOS timeline. Also note that the Alpha Quadrant never had contact with those in the Gamma Quadrant.

Alternative Timeline in the Gamma Quadrant? I really doubt it. But one thing's for sure, the Founders would still be in their places in the Gamma Quadrant.

And yes, the Alliance would have discovered the wormhole the moment that runabout dissappeared in it. Whether they actually went through it or not is anyone's guess.

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I can resist anything.......
Except Temptation

Posted by Omega (Member # 91) on :

I'd like to know what the original divergence was. What caused the mirror to be so different?

Didn't someone say that there were no orbs on mirror Bajor? That would imply that either they were never found (hard to believe), or the Prophets have a specific connection to our Bajor, and thus never sent orbs to Mirror. Here's a theory: the Prophets and wormhole only exist in our universe for whatever reason. Kira and Bashier's jaunt into Mirror may have been specifically arranged by the prophets to get the Sisko to visit the other side on a couple of occasions. Maybe meeting Jenny's counterpart and seeing her die was essential to their plans. Convoluted, I know, but it would explain why the Alliance never discovered the wormhole. It's not there in their universe without the Prophets specifically wanting it to be. As far as they saw, the damaged runabout disappeared, and that disappearance was accompanied by a nutreno surge. They may have just assumed that it was destroyed when they couldn't find a wormhole. Or maybe sucked into an unstable wormhole. Imbalances in warp engines can cause those.

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Meddle not in the affairs of Dragons; for you are crunchy and good with ketchup.

Posted by TSN (Member # 31) on :

Remember that not everything in the mirror universe is antithetical to its counterpart. This has been the case since "Mirror, Mirror" where the planet the E was at was identical in both universes. There are other examples in the DS9 eps: Klingons are still warriors, Ferengi are still greedy, Garak seemed pretty much himself (albeit slightly more submissive, what w/ that collar and leash Worf had on him)...

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"Agh! Save me from the wee turtles!"
-Groundskeeper Willy, The Simpsons

Posted by Kosh (Member # 167) on :

Also, the station was in orbit of Bajor, instead of being near the Wormhole, so they may not have seen where the runabout went.

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Fool of a Took, throw yourself in next time!!
Gandalf

Posted by Aban Rune (Member # 226) on :

O.K. a couple of things:

The station may not have seen although it's sensors are more than capable of monitoring the wormhole from Bajoran orbit, but the ships in pursuit of the Runabout surely would have.

Also, the Bajoran wormhole was created by the Prophets. I don't like the explanation that the Prophets engineered the trips to the Mirror. I think the Prophets (the same Prophets) exist there too. They are non linear, after all.

I think the big question is, "where did the divergeance come?" as asked above. If we're talking about an alternate timeline here, then the Gamma Quad would not be effected at all. If it's an alternate universe though, where things really are alternate and there was no point in time where the two shared a common timeline, then there be some differences.

Hmmmm.......

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"Resolve and thou art free."

Posted by Nim (Member # 205) on :

And that's what it's all about! Hmmms... Just give me a good inconcistancy and the stars to steer by!

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-You're crazy!!!
-Funny, I thought I was pisces!

Posted by The First One (Member # 35) on :

I think you're taking the concept of 'mirror' too literally. In TOS - and continued in the novel "Dark Mirror" - the mirror universe was a aplace where the very nature of things had been twisted. Picard in the book finds some telling changes to Shakespeare, for instance. But by the time DS9 get to it, it's changed and is just a chance for the actors to do things a little differently. I've never been interested in the DS9 mirror universe tales.

Posted by Saltah'na (Member # 33) on :

It was the Klingon ship which should have seen the runabout dissappear into the wormhole.

And the other reason why the orbs were never found, three words: No Cardassian Occupation. Because the Cardassians formed an alliance with the Klingons to defeat the Pacifist Federation, the Cardassians had the luxury of plundering other worlds instead of Bajor (which is why in the real universe, they annexed Bajor in the first place).

I believe that it was during the occupation that many Bajorans went to seek out the Prophets for guidance in a time of despair. And in the Mirror universe, it appears that they never needed to.......

One other thing, since the Prophets have no concept of Linear time, do you think they'd be aware of everything that happens in ALL mirror universes?

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I can resist anything.......
Except Temptation

Posted by AndrewR (Member # 44) on :

The mirror universe is not directly opposite to our universe - as a few of you have mentioned - its not bizzaro world

Things just panned out differently...

I think Bajor is a POWER too, I've never noticed it before but has anyone noticed that the alliance symbol incorporates the Cardassians, the Klingons and sorta the bajoran symbol - i.e. the round part - and the 'wings' of the cardassian part are also a part of the Bajoran symbol!?!

Oh, and the ferengi aren't greedy in the mirror universe - as you can see - Quark was benevolent to Kira and Bashir's cause.

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"Remove your hand or I will remove your arm!" - 7 of 9

[This message has been edited by AndrewR (edited November 07, 1999).]

Posted by TSN (Member # 31) on :

Remeber Nog's line when he helped the Intendant escape? Something about "If you hadn't killed my father and uncle, I never would have gotten their business", or some such. Apparently they still are greedy.

In the novel Spectre, Spock and the mirror Spock figure out about when the universes diverged, but I don't recall what it was...

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"Agh! Save me from the wee turtles!"
-Groundskeeper Willy, The Simpsons

Posted by Obi Juan (Member # 90) on :

The general assumption seems to be that if the prophets existed in the mirror universe, it would be the same prophets; because the are non-linear they also can coexist in alternate planes. I prefer a line of reasoning similar to Mucus- there might be alternative prophets who perhaps aren't so nice. This would explain why the Cardie/Klingon/Bajoran allaince was able to exploit it- any ship they sent through got fried.
I do like the idea of a benevolent Dominion who could have stepped in and helped the rebels overthrough their oppressors.
In fact I think something like this was needed. I assumed that at the end of TENC that the rebel had supposedly wone because they killed Worf. I don't really want to go into bashing that episode again but they really needed to provide the rebels with some type of advantage that could make them a plausable threat against their enemies (no not the Defiant).Unfortunately, the whole mirror universe storyline offered so many great possibilities that were ignored in favor of more shallow uncreative stories.

Posted by TSN (Member # 31) on :

Andrew: I forgot to mention this in my post yesterday. I think the wings in the Alliance symbol are supposed to be just that: wings. And the circle at the bottom is merely the circle that has always been part of the Klingon symbol.

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Rimmer: "Holly, put a trace on Paranoia."
Holly: "What's a trace?"
Rimmer: "It's space jargon. It means 'find him'."
Holly: "No it doesn't. You just made it up to sound cool."
-Red Dwarf: "Confidence & Paranoia"

Posted by Aban Rune (Member # 226) on :

I totally agree that the Mirror stories lost alot of opportunities and sorta got shallow. TENC was kinda cool but seemed more an excuse to use Quark, do something else stupid with Vic (what the hell was that about?), and get another mirror girl on girl thing going.

I've never read the Mirror books, but I prefer to think of the Mirror Universe as an alternate reality. Someone said up a couple of posts about the nature of things being twisted. I like that. I don't think there ever was a temporal connection (although I do think the same Prophets are there).

Also, the fact that the Mirror Bariel didn't know what a Vedek was in Resurrection, implies that the Mirror Bajor has no religious structure. The existance of the wormhole implies that the Prophets were trying to contact someone in that universe, but obviously, no one ever found anything.

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"Resolve and thou art free."

Posted by The First One (Member # 35) on :

Right now it seems there are two Mirror Universes. Mirror Universe 1 (MU1) was first seen in TOS "Mirror, Mirror" and continued as MU1a ("Dark Mirror") and MU1b ("Avenger" and "Spectre"); I make the distinction because I haven't read the former book in years so can't remember what it established as happened to MirrorKirk and MirrorSpock - I think I remember a mention of MSpock failing. Then the latter books have MKirk now as the Emperor Tiberius, but as I haven't read them I don't know if MSpock is mentioned.

But of course that's not canon, while Mirror Universe 2 as featured in DS9 has MSpock's reforms weakening the Empire so it is taken over by the Bajoran-Klingon-Cardassian alliance. Humans beings, instead of being thoroughly nasty pieces of work, are now downtrodden, and any nastiness exhibited by the alternate versions of people we've seen can be put down to their situation.

Give me MU1 any day. Heck, I'd love there to be a movie based on it, then Shatner might get his wish to be Kirk again. But the 2 Universes are now so differenet they can never be credibly integrated.

Posted by Gaseous Anomaly (Member # 114) on :

I don't know, TSN -- I think Andrew might have something there.
If you remove the Cardassian and Klingon symbols you can (well I can at any rate) just about discern the sides of the Bajoran crest -- not too sure about the circle at the bottom though.

I always thought it'd be cool if our Sisko travelled through the Mirror wormhole and met the Founders, who weren't a bit different from the warmongerers we all know and love.
He'd then be offered to make a devilish pact with the Dominion in which they'd conquer the Alliance, thus freeing the Humans from them but subjugating them under the (admittedly) more benign hand of the Dominion. Sisko could then be faced with the Founders finding out where he comes from (the Dominion being aware of the existence of parallel worlds in theory, but not ours), perhaps imperiling his race even more.

Just a pipe dream that I had years ago, mind.
The above analyses have shattered my childhood innocence and fastasies.
*runs off sobbing, looking for his blankie*

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"Fire, Fire!" said Mrs O'Dwyer.
"Where, where?" said Mrs O'Hare.
"Down in the town." said Mrs Brown.
"Lord bless us and save us"
said old Mrs Davis.
"I never knew a herring was a fish."

Posted by TSN (Member # 31) on :

Lee: I haven't read those Shatner books recently enough to remember, either, but I was under the impression that they tried to keep as close to the TV/movie stuff as possible, including the mirror universe arc.

Posted by Warped1701 (Member # 40) on :

IIRC, in Spectre the two Spocks managed to figure out what caused the two universes to diverge. But before Spock could tell Kirk, the mirror Picard showed up and attacked the mirror Voyager.

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"I see you have the ring. And that your Schwartz is as big as mine!
-Dark Helmet, Spaceballs

Posted by First of Two (Member # 16) on :

Actually, from what I've been able to glean, the Mirror Federation started to diverge just after 2063.

Recognize that date?

Remember what time-spanning event occurred on that date?

Remember what darker power was involved?

It appears that the Empire was that Federation's response to discovering the Borg existed. I surmise that in that timeline, the E-E wasn't entirely successful in hiding the Borg's influence... which created its own miniuniverse.

ARRGH! Head hurts.. I HATE temporal paradoxes!

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Calvin: "No efficiency, no accountability... I tell you, Hobbes, it's a lousy way to run a Universe." -- Bill Watterson

Baloo and I have been reading the same books :)

Posted by Hobbes (Member # 138) on :

But in the mirror universe there was no Enterprise-D for Q to send to the Delta Quadrant. Therefore the Borg never came to Earth, or went back to 2063.

In our universe then perhaps it was the Borg and Enterprise-E that caused the timeline to go as we know it.

Just a thought. If I go any deeper into the whole paradox thing I'll need to take an asprin and lay down.

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Calvin: "I'm a man of few words."
Hobbes: "Maybe if you read more, you'd have a larger vocabulary."
Federation Starship Datalink - Now with a pop-up on every page...damn you Tripod!

Posted by Michael Dracon (Member # 4) on :

Just to make matters more complicated: There were Federation-Borg encounters before the Ent-D was flung away by Q.

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Posted by Aban Rune (Member # 226) on :

I've still gotta go with the alternate reality theory. I don't think there ever was a temporal connection. I say this mainly because, if this was alternate timeline, the odds of any of the human crew of DS9 ever being born let alone being together are astronomical. If, however, the two universes are alternate realities tied loosely by similar events, structures, and people, it makes alot more sense.

It also allows for "connection points" where certain things would remain basically the same. The Vulcans and the planet in "Mirror, Mirror" for example.

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"Resolve and thou art free."

Posted by Saltah'na (Member # 33) on :

Perhaps WWIII turned out a bit differently than in out Universe.

I read about a comic series called "The Mirror Universe Saga", and it gives an explanation to how a possible mirror universe came about.

In this series, both universes have the same timeline until the time of the Earth-Romulan War. In our universe, the war was fought in Deep Space and ended with the Feds winning at the Battle of Cheron. In this mirror universe, the war was instead fought in the Earth Solar System. Because of this, the Romulans captured Earth and held it in slavery for nearly a decade, until a resistance movement was able to overthrow their oppressors. Unfortunately, this resistance movement didn't disband when the overthrow was completed. Instead, the leader of the resistance became the leader of the new Earth Empire itself, with a very power hungry agenda. Their doctrine was suited to the people of a world that was previously conquered. Put it in a quote in the series "Never shall we be the conquered, from this day on, we shall be the conquerors!!!" And they became known as the power hungry Empire that they were in the Mirror universe.

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I can resist anything.......
Except Temptation

Posted by Fabrux (Member # 71) on :

Well, the theory that I've heard the most, and I like the most, is that Khan was never overthrown in the mirror universe. He wasn't stopped, ergo he started the whole expansionist movement. That would explain the whole Earth Empire right there.

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"Waaawhooo! Lookie here ma, I caught me a lightnin' bug!"
-Jetstorm

Posted by Baloo (Member # 5) on :

Transcript of an ICQ conversation (my end only. If the other party wants to supply the in-between bits, he is free to do so):

Then why weren't there any enhanced humans? You'd think that Khan and his descendants would be leading the charge, rather than prodding from behind.
{Response: Still believes the "Khan won" theorie makes more sense.}
Maybe some other enhanced human(s) instead of Khan. I'm sure that there must've been one or two who would operate from behind the scenes, rather than from in front. All of Khan's followers seemed to be "man-of-action" types.
Perhaps if the Eugenics wars had been nipped in the bud by a master manipulator who had all the other enhanced humans "eliminated"? To protect him/herself from new rivals, the technology could still be outlawed, and that would be it. No eugenics wars, no Khan, but instead, an insidious, paranoid fantasy becomes real?
{Response: Bashir was enhanced. What about him?}
Well, in any case, he was produced outside official channels. Even in a universe filled with megalomaniacs, there will be some who want their children to be tougher than the rest, and willing to pay for the means to make it happen.

--Baloo

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It is less important that you agree with me than it is for you to to understand what I'm saying.

http://members.tripod.com/~Bob_Baloo/index.htm