The Delta Flyers - Empok Nor

Episode Date: May 26, 2026

The Delta Flyers is hosted by Garrett Wang, Robert Duncan McNeill, Terry Farrell, and Armin Shimerman. In each podcast release, they will recap and discuss an episode of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.This week’s episode,Empok Nor, is hosted by Garrett Wang, Robert Duncan McNeill, and Armin Shimerman. Empok Nor: A foray to an abandoned Cardassian space station for needed parts finds two Cardassians in stasis tubes, and a drug that turns Garak into a killer.We would like to thank everyone who makes this podcast possible, starting with our Production Managers, Megan Elise and Rebecca McNeill.Additionally, we could not make this podcast available without our Executive Producers:Stephanie Baker, Jason M Okun, Luz R., Marie Burgoyne, Kris Hansen, Chris Knapp, Janet K Harlow, Rich Gross, Mary Jac Greer, Mike Gu, Tara Polen, Carrie Roberts,Tom Paynter, Sandra Stengel, AJC, Nicholaus Russell, Alex Mednis, Holly Schmitt, Roxane Ray, Tim Neumark, Ian Ramsey, Feroza Mehta, Jenny Cordina, Ryan Mahieu, Izzy Jaffer, Francesca Garibaldi, Jonathan Capps, Chris Dellman, Sean T, Cindy Woodford, Tamara Evans, Shawn Robbins, & Francis Our Co-Executive Producers:Liz Scott, Sarah A Gubbins, Utopia Science Fiction Magazine, Elaine Ferguson, Captain Jeremiah Brown, Deike Hoffmann, Anna Post, Cindy Ring, Lee Lisle, Holly Smith, Amy Tudor, Mark G Hamilton, KMB, Dominic Burgess, Normandy Madden, Joseph Michael Kuhlman, Darryl Cheng, Elizabeth Stanton, Tim Beach, Victor Ling, Shambhavi Kadam, David Wei Liu, Donna Runyon, Nicholas Albano, Andrew Duncan, Randy Hawke, Penny Liu, Matt Norris, David Smith, Heath K., Andrew Cano, Robby Hill, Kevin Harlow, Jeff Allen, & Londyn HenningAnd our Producers:Philipp Havrilla, James Amey, Jake Barrett, Ann Harding, Trip Lives, Samantha Weddle, Paul Johnston, Carole Patterson, Warren Stine, Carl Murphy, Jocelyn Pina, Chad Awkerman, AJ Provance, Brian King, Maxine Soloway, Heidi McLellan, E & John, Brianna Kloss, Dat Cao, Stephen Riegner, Debra Defelice, Alexander Ray, Kelly Brown, Sarah Thompson, Gabriel Dominic Girgis, Renee Wiley, Maria Rosell, Dominique Weidle, Jesse Bailey, Mike Chow, Matt Edmonds, Miki T, Heather Selig, Steph Davies, Stephanie Aves, Seth Carlson, Amy Rambacher, Jessica B, Annie Davey, Jason Eberl, Jeremy Gaskin, Sarah Dunnevant, Charlie Faulkner, Estelle Keller, Eddie Dawson, Lauren Rivers, Jennifer B, PJ Pick, Preston M, Rebecca Leary, SnazzyO, Karen Galleski, Jan Hanford, Katelynn Burmark, Cade Solsbery, Timothy McMichens, Cassandra Girard, Andrea Wilson, Slacktwaddle, Willow Whitcomb, Mo, Leslie Ford, Jay Furness, Jim Poesl, Scott Bowling, Michael Jones, Ed Jarot, James Vanhaerent, Nick Cook-West, Kilian Trapp, Kit Marie Rackley, Gordon Watson, Andrew Golden, Damien O’Donnell, Michael Bourguignon, & Patricia WelschThank you for your support!This Podcast is recorded under a SAG-AFTRA agreement.“Our creations are protected by copyright, trademark, and trade secret laws. Some examples of our creations are the text we use, artwork we create, audio, and video we produce and post. You may not use, reproduce, or distribute our creations unless we give you permission. If you have any questions, you can email us at [e-mail] Sponsors:* Check out Quince: https://quince.com/tdfAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Hello, everyone. Welcome to the Delta Flyers Journey Through the Wormhole with Quark, Dax, and their good friends, Tom and Harry. Join us as we make our way through episodes of Star Trek, Deep Space Nine. Wow, that's a lot. It is a lot, and I'm saddened to think that we are almost towards the end here, at least closer to the end than we were at the beginning. Don't even say that, Armin. Don't even talk about it. We don't even want to think about it. I can't believe we've gone through these episodes. It's incredible.

It's flown by. We've almost finished the fifth season. Yes. There's only seven seasons. I know. And when I was reviewing this one, I said, wait a minute. This is almost the end of season five. It really did creep up on all of us, I feel.

It really did. Yeah. But it was an amazing adventure. Amazing adventure. I've learned so much. Me too. Do you remember, though, that feeling as you got to like the end of season five shooting the series?

And we typically thought, oh, seven years is what they did back then. So I remember around the end of season five as we started going to season six, I was like, oh my gosh. You know, it's two years of filming left, but only two years. We were well beyond halfway through, you know. What was your feeling then? What were you feeling at that point? Bittersweet, I think, you know, I think excited to move on to other projects and try other things. but also there was a lot of security and comfort in having a steady job.

Yeah. Well, there wasn't security for me because I was in the midst of negotiating my contract. Oh, we negotiated my contract. So there was a lot of trepidation. But I must say at the end of every season, up until the last season, at the end of every season, Renee and I would have a quarrel about whether or not there would be a pickup for the next season. I said from the very first season I said, Renee, it's going to be seven years.

And he would say, you have no assurance of that. Right. And we would go back and forth. And even here at the end of the fifth season, we were still arguing about whether it was going to happen. Wow. Armand, did everyone on DS9 renegotiate season five? Did everyone do that?

The answer is I don't know. I do know that at the end of season five, a group of us, I don't know if I should name names or not, but a group four, let's say four people. Okay. All banded together to renegotiate. as a unit. Oh, sweet. I know the four of us banded together and, and we got a sizable raise because it was a unit. Oh, wow. Very nice. Always better to work together. Yeah, for sure. Yeah,

strengthened numbers. All right, let's jump into some birthdays. Okay, our first birthday is Sarah Thompson, Sarah Bean Thompson. May 25th is your birthday. Happy, happy, happy birthday, Sarah. Sarah, happy birthday. May 25th, that's a very good day. Happy birthday, SBT. Next up we have Caitlin. Burmark on May 25th also. Happy birthday to Caitlin. Caitlin, congratulations. You share the birthday with Sarah. Yay. Happy birthday, Caitlin. Have a great day. Our next birthday is Heather Selig on May 31st. Happy birthday, Heather. Heather. Heather, happy birthday. Happy birthday, Heather. And of course, we also have on June 1st, Marie Burgoin. Happy birthday, Marie. Marie, happy birthday. Happy birthday, Marie. Another June 1st birthday is Ian Ramsey. Ian, happy birthday. Ian, happy birthday. To our local bard, happy birthday to you, Ian.

And also, PJ Pick, June 5th. Happy birthday, PJ. Happy birthday. Happy birthday, PJ. All right, poetry synopsis, Robbie. Yes, here we go. Another satisfying limerick. They woke what should have been left asleep, an instinct that was buried quite deep. was uncaged. Garrick's darkness rampaged. But our character is much more than skin deep. Excellent. Excellent.

Applaus. Yes. Good job, Robbie. Oh, thank you. Yeah. Yeah, this is an interesting, just from a lesson theme moral aspect from just the characters. I really like this episode a lot. Yeah.

I think your second stanza is superb, an instinct that was buried. quite deep. Ooh, yeah. What's about that darkness? We all have inside of us, right? But just the way you frame that and worded that, I'm so impressed. And this is, I'm going to, I'm going to give this like a 9.9 in terms of, if I was rating your limericks, this is one of the top ones for me.

Oh, wow. Thank you. It gave me goosebumps. So, all right. Here is my haiku for Empaknor. Mission for Salvage. Cardi death team on the loose. Chief defeats Garrick

That's it Nice Thanks You chuckled on Cardi I got you on that one Yeah Okay All ready

We also Ety Yes Ety from Armin I searched the dictionaries There is no word called Empach No

Oh boy Nor was just too easy So I decided to write a poem Instead Oh Oh We are We are lucky today

Wow. Okay. We'll see how lucky we are. I don't aspire to your brilliance, both of you, but I did what I could. Let's hear it. I can't wait. Yeah. Garrick and O'Brien go to M.Pak Noor. Instead of scavenging, they go to war.

Drugs and savagery are the reasons for an episode leaving me craving more. Oh. Oh, good job. Nice. Armine. Armine. I'm going to say right now, anytime you want to scrap etymology

and jump into poetry for us, we'll take it. We'll take it. Oh, my God. You're approved. You're officially approved. Yep. Kind. You're very kind.

Good job, bro. It's less nerve-wracking to look upwards. Yes. I can imagine. Yeah, the poetry, you're kind of putting yourself out there a bit. Yeah. We have a Patreon-submitted poetry, Yes, we do.

And it's wonderful. Yeah. Yeah. Take it away. Sure. This is narrative verse submitted by Jason Okun. Deep in the shadows of a long abandoned core, where darkness hid what had to stay entombed, the prey became the predator of war when poison claimed the mind that once presumed.

The hunter and the hunted share one face. When science gone awry erased the line between. between and those who sought to flee that wretched place must fight the beast he never should have been. Nice. Jason's very professional. I know he's a lawyer by trade, but this is good, very creative stuff. Good stuff. We also have a patron submitted poetry honorable mention for haiku, and that is submitted by Matt Edmonds.

Oh, for Matt. The haiku goes like this. abandoned station, an experiment gone wrong. Engineering wins. Nice. Why do you think the experiment went wrong? Well, they abandoned, maybe because they left those guys behind because they couldn't control it or for whatever reason it was too much. Or they just left them there, you know, to patrol.

I mean, we're told, well, getting a little early, but we told their booby traps, this may be the, The ultimate booby trap. Yeah. True. The death team. True, true, true. Who wrote this, Karen? Hans Beimler.

I'm going to speak it with a German accent. Hans Paimla is the one who wrote this episode. Story by Brian Fuller, directed by Mike Veher. Very well directed. Very well directed. Agreed. We like Mike. We like Mike.

All right, guest stars. Andrew J. Robinson is Garrick. Aaron Eisenberg is Nagar. Tom Hodge. as Bichetti, Andy Milder as Bukta, Marjohn Holden as Stols-Off, Jeffrey King as Amaro. There we go. Great. I want to say Tom Hodges, who plays Pachetti, was best friends with my childhood friend,

Carmen Thomas. I knew Tom for years. Wow. Yeah. Tom's a great guy. Yeah. And, yeah, it was just fun to see him. I didn't know he did any Star Trek.

So all of a sudden, yeah, seeing Tom was fun. Well, you would have, we would have been in season two. so he could have been walking out of makeup and you could have seen him then. Isn't that crazy? Then you had no clue. Maybe I don't I don't remember. This is now I'm going back to my bad memory, but I really don't remember seeing Tom. It surprised me when he came out in this episode, but it was fun to see him.

Yeah. Very cool. And by the way, this is the first episode of Lower Dex. It is? This is the first time people who are in Lower Dex are actually in Blondex. Or showcased. Well, I will say... This is their lower-dex episode.

Yeah, this is a lower-dex episode. I will say as soon as a bunch of new people started talking, I was like, they're going to die. Yeah. I'm wearing red shirts, but they're going to die. Gold is the new red. Instead of orange is the new black, gold is the new red. Okay. A little bit of trivia in Brian Fuller's original pitch for this episode, the story involved

Wharf and Garrick. They come across a derelict ship adrift. It turns out to be a vessel, which belonged to the obsidian o'clock. order. It is littered with bodies and as they attempt to work out what happened, Garrick turns on Wharf and sets out to kill him. Fuller compared this idea to the 1978 film Blue Sunshine. So that was the original pitch. Then it got kind of, you know, maneuvered around a little bit. Hans Spimler's first draft of the teleplay for this episode did not feature any of the various exchanges between O'Brien and Garrick. This draft was not popular with the entire cast and crew,

according to Andrew J. Robinson, quote, after I finished the first draft, I thought, oh, I felt the writers were intruding on Garrick. I never could have done that first script. We were vacuums. There was nothing in my character. It made no sense. Similarly, unimpressed was Iris Stephen Bear. Quote, I told Hans, this doesn't work, not even close.

There's no character, no meaning. It's just a series of events, and none of it makes any sense. Beimler returned to the script and composed another draft, this time adding much more depth to the relationship between Garrick and O'Brien, and also bringing O'Brien's background as a soldier into play. Oh, so that came out of the dissatisfaction. Interesting. Yeah, from the first draft.

To me, that's a huge part of this episode. Yeah, it's what drives the entire episode, correct? So, yeah. It is fascinating to me who spent seven years on Deep Space Nine that Andy, as well as everyone else, had access to the original script. That never happened for me. Yeah. I never, nor did, and maybe it's just me, as Mr. Brooks once said to me, you're too dutiful.

Maybe, and I never sort of said, okay, we have to change this. Once, I did once. I've already told that story many times, but I am gobsmacked that Andy got a script early and was able to complain about it and ask for changes to be made. And they did. That is, you see, you learn something every day. I had no idea. Yeah. Wow.

But also from what I've read, it could be that he got the advanced script, which is again, rare, the first draft, read it, said those thoughts to himself, did not, you know what I'm saying? And it was actually Ira reading that first draft. And he was the final say and said, hey, you know, Bimler, you need to change this up. So I don't, I don't know if this quote really explain. It's hard to know when he's hard to know if he said anything about it when he read the first draft is what I'm saying. You know, that's all. Okay. That makes more sense to me.

Right. Because for an actor, yeah. For an actor, especially with all due respect to my friend Andy, who was practically a series regular. Right. For a non-series regular to have that power, I certainly never had it. No, no. It just is startling. I agree. So it also is surprising to me that the script got through, you know, studio notes, network notes, all those versions, then got to the director to prep. because often a director would get a copy of a draft before the actors.

They would have to have time to prep it. So it got to a director, it went through all of that. And by the time it got to actors, they did a major rewrite. That seems strange to me. I agree with you, Armin. It seems something about the timing of when, you know, if Ira had that strong a reaction to Hans's first draft, it would never have gotten to a director in that shape. He would have said that given those notes before it even got to the director, much less the actor.

So, but it sounds like the process at one or more points, people had concerns about the script. And I'm glad they did because those concerns were addressed. And it's a better episode because of them. It's one of my favorite episodes. I've got to be honest. It's one of my favorite of all of your shows so far. It's because of Mike Veyer. I agree.

He made it into a movie. I also feel that, and I read somewhere that Andy was a little tentative about playing this role because in it, as we know, some killing happens. And his breakout role was the 1971 Dirty Harry film where he played the Scorpio Killer. And that really affected his personal life in terms of how people viewed him. How they, am I right? Yes. It caused him to lose a job on a soap opera. Yeah.

It caused a lot of people to think of him only as the Zodiac Killer. Yes. And he had problems with it. People may or may not know if you play an iconic role, oftentimes you get pigeonholed in that role and you can't get any other work because people will just remember you that way. I know that whenever I would go to an audition, they would say, oh, we love your work.

I would go, oh, I didn't get this part. Oh, my God. Yeah, and he really, so when he saw the script and what he had to do, he kept feeling, I guess it brought back memories of what happened in 1971. That PTSD of the post-post work PTSD that happened then kind of brought back up again in this episode in a way. And knowing Andy, he wouldn't want to redo something he'd done before. It's not that he didn't want to visit those emotions. It's simply, I'm not going to do the same performance again.

I'm just not going to do that. All right. One last piece of trivia. Sarak Lofton does not appear in this episode. unfortunately. Seems like a pattern this season. Yeah. More than any other season.

I think Jake's been out of more episodes of this season. Which is strange because there are more episodes with Nog. Yes. That's true. Yeah. The balance is had a lot to do this. Yeah. Yeah.

Well, we start off in Quarks and Dax, Worf, Kira come in. We hear a jackhammer. There's no customers in the, in the bar. There are some bar. there. mourn is there. Oh, yeah. Yeah,

Morn doesn't care. He's fine with us. He's fine. But there are some others. There are some others. There are very few. A couple of people are pretty empty. You remember, gentlemen,

what happened to Morn the prior episode? He was naked and screaming. He was naked. Nothing bothers him. Yeah, he needs a drink after that last episode. That's why he's there. But he hit me.

I'm surprised I served him a drink. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, why? He should be banned. He should be banned. But his money's good. His money's good. Especially with the lack of customers.

He's the last, yeah, beggars can't be choosers. That's right. Jack hammering. I like how you try to pretend you didn't hear it. You're like, what noise? Oh, that. That's snogging, O'Brien, repairing some conduit. You'll get used to it.

And understand, the Ferranchi you're supposed to hear really well. And too much noise can be very upsetting, as you can understand. Yeah. So it's got to be problematic. And in fact, at the end of the scene, I actually do grimace with that. Yeah, I saw it. Yeah. I saw you react to some of the jackhammering.

Yeah, so it sounds like a jackhammer. They decided to go to the Klingon restaurant. Nog comes in. Cork asks him, you know, how much longer. And he says, you know, not too much longer, but he needs two root beers, which I thought was adorable. Since we've never seen O'Brien drink root beer, it's surprising. Okay. Well, it's interesting.

In the next scene, we go in the comment. conduit and he didn't bring the root beers back for him or, uh, because he, because he drank them both before he got up there. No, no, no, no, no. Where are they? He gave one to Jake. Oh, okay, fine. All right.

He gave. Thank you. We go in the conduit. The root beers aren't there. And I don't see a jackhammer anywhere. So where was that noise coming from? They've got little tools. I was like, that was a little overkill on the noise.

I was expecting like hard hats and, you know, cement everywhere. Anyway, Nog is helping Miles fix a conduit. He's right on top of it. Like Miles asked for something and Nog has it. It looks like they're done. And then Nog leans back like two construction workers kind of relaxing after a job. And the conduit explodes with the smoke in their faces and they're just wiped out in a cloud of steam or something. And may I say the first, perhaps, of many wonderful shots by Mike Veyer.

Yeah. It's the pushing. I love the pushing on the two of them, starting from outside of the Jeffrey's tube and just pushing in on him on them. I love that. I agree. I didn't comment on that shot because there's so many shots. There's so many shots. But it was every scene had a nice transition, had an opening move or something interesting.

Lots of pans that. go across from one character and next and then eventually end up on the person who is speaking. Yeah. Yeah, really well done. We go up to ops. Well, speaking of shots, here's one. They're walking. We're not in ops. The camera

is in the captain's office, but they're outside in ops and it's panning through the window. So we're getting a bit of a walk and talk outside the window. And then we hear that Miles wants to go to MPCNOR. This brings them into the room, just beautifully done. He didn't just start them standing in front of Cisco's desk.

He started them on the move. You had some geography and some camera movement. It was great. Yeah. Anyway, Miles wants to go to Empoknor, salvage some parts so he can fix this Cardassian ship because they don't have any Cardassian parts. Cisco says, well, you're probably going to want to bring a Cardassian to the station because they booby-trapped everything.

The standard Cardassian procedure is to booby-trap a facility. they abandon it and there could be surprises. So you should bring a Cardassian because they are specifically keyed to attack only non-Cardacians. So they're going to need a Cardassian. Who could that be? Who could that be? In the office, did you remember Cisco saying, can you replicate a new one? And O'Brien's saying, no, Cardassian manifolds use a beta matrix compositor.

I don't recall that line at all because the entire time that I'm watching this episode, I kept thinking, why didn't they just replicate the parts? Why do they go to Empunknore? He says it. They can't be replicated. Okay. I miss that entirely. And I feel badly for all the actors in this episode because there's more techno babble in this episode than I can ever remember from any other episode.

Oh, boy. They're constantly doing engineering terms and the like. And Colum had some long speeches of you go do this to the this and the this and this and then you guys go do this to the this to the this and this. I was like, oh, Colum. Because I know he learns his lines the day off. Yeah, we remember he learned it the day up. So he's like, oh boy. Oh, boy.

We go into the airlock. So another nice transition. It comes right out of Pichetti's back and reveals O'Brien and Garrick in the airlock. You know, he could have just cut to a two shot of them standing there, but he's got this reveal with a blocking. And then it pushes in on O'Brien and Garrick. Yeah, so it's a beautiful opening shot. And this shot, I don't know if you guys were aware, it's a oneer for a long time.

Yes, it is. It is a runner. Yeah. It's shocking. It comes out of Prisetti's back, reveals O'Brien and Garrick talking about Garrick volunteering. He says, well, how do you know I didn't volunteer? Garrick admits that, okay, the captain bribed me. He offered me a much larger space for my workshop. And the latest dressmaking equipment is very bulky. So, so they start. start talking in the airlock. They walk into the runabout. Still a oneer. This shot goes on forever. Oh, my gosh. Garek notices that everybody's being nice to him. And he said pretty soon they're going to invite me to their homes for dinner. Brian's like, no, I don't think so. Don't worry. I'm never inviting you. They keep talking in this oneer that hands off to vodka sitting on the runabout. He overhears them talking about the booby traps he gets up shot continues still one shot yeah goes back in the airlock well red shirts all talk pachetti's very excited uh we meet stolsoff and amaro the security officers that are coming with them they're not worried and i did make a note with amaro that i like amaro in a cocktail

it's a delicious liqueur and so i was happy to see his name so anyway so we meet the red shirts and I'm going to call them red shirts because I knew immediately they're talking way too much for strangers going on a mission. They're going to die for sure. Whoa. I can't believe that was a oneer. I didn't even notice that. I was gobsmacked at how long that winner went on. And often oneers can feel, I don't know, like they're there to give you suspense and tension, whereas this oneer was just an incredibly elegant way of covering the scene without.

shooting coverage. It was between the blocking and the camera moves. It just went on and on in a seamless way. And I think it also adds to the pace. I think by not having any cuts, it adds to the pace of the scene. And, and, you know, the actors were moving a pace. And and so it all worked for me that already I'm beginning to feel Mike Veher in charge pushing this episode along as quickly as he could. But it was one of the first. But it was one is that long, though. It's a little nerve-wracking because everyone's got to be on point. If one person drops their line, start it again.

It could just, oh, it could be a really long process if people aren't focused. So we find them a little later in the runabout. They're en route and Garrick and Nag are playing some game called, what is the name of the game? Is it Katra? Where is it? Katra, yes, it is.

It's Katra. They're playing Katra. Cardassian strategy game, I guess. Yeah. Garrick is sort of digging at Miles to O'Brien to come play with him. He wants O'Brien to play him because he's very interested in Miles' story about Settlic 3. And we've heard about Settlic 3 before where O'Brien had to engage in combat. And there was a very bloody battle there. He's mentioned this before. So he has. Garrick's interested in this when Miles killed a lot of Cardassians. Yeah, I wasn't sure what was

going on other than he's just, I don't know, curiosity. Like, he's never ever brought this up before with him, right? I mean, we hear about Settlic 3. I don't think so. But they're going to a Cardassian station. So I'm sure Garrick's connection to being a Cardassian is being, you know, triggered. Yeah, triggered. Yes. Yes. And knowing that Miles killed probably dozens of Kardashians in this battle.

He's a hero of this battle. A regiment. Somewhere in the episode, it says a regiment of Kardashians. That's a lot. That's a lot. Well, Garrick says, we all know your distinguished war. war record you know how you led two dozen men in against the barracka encampment and took out an entire regiment of Kardashians there you go it's a lot of people so he was clearly not the miles we know the

engineer who just fixes things he was a soldier miles ultimately says no I don't want to play you I don't want to don't want to play this war game peshetti comes in he's got a list of everything they need also he's got some souvenirs on the list which I thought was an interesting little character detail that this engineer guy just loves souvenirs. It plays to the mindset of the stereotype of an engineer. Yeah. You know, that they're all sort of slightly nerdy. Yes, exactly.

And that's a stereotype, not the reality, just a stereotype. Yeah. Guys, just quickly, a modern regiment typically consists of 2,000 to 5,000 soldiers. So he took 12 guys to take out thousands of soldiers. That's huge. I think our show once got awarded an award for being the bloodiest show on TV. Oh, my gosh. We killed so many people on our show, and this being an example of just one.

Talking about it. Yeah. Well, a little later on the run about Nog is driving, guys. What? Nog was flying this whole. I was like, can everybody fly? I guess so. Have you flown, Armin?

Did you ever fly in the shuttle? I'm trying to remember with the Renee. I piloted a shuttle. Yeah. But I wasn't at the control. So I was sitting in the captain's chair, but I wasn't at the actual. Well, Nog is running the show here. He's driving the ship.

We do see M-Pak-Nor for the first time. It's sideways, which I thought was a really cool look. We learned they can't beam over. Nog volunteers to, Maas says, let's go to the upper pylon. We'll go in an airlock. Nog volunteers, but Garrick says, nope, you can't do it because I'm the only one with the right DNA. I'll have to go in there.

So they're talking about the booby traps. They're kind of setting up this ghost ship sort of tone. As we're talking about this scene and Nog's participation in this scene, it suddenly occurred to me, why is Nog in this episode? Does he advance the story at all?

I don't think he. I mean, there's some lovely moments with Aaron and he does a very nice job. But why is he in this episode? I'm confused about what Nog's apprenticeship is. Is he, you know, he's still a cadet, but is he heading down a engineering track? Is he heading down a command track? Right now he's in a security.

That's his role. He's part of security. We saw that in the last episode. Okay. I think that I think his internship changes. It just, it changes from one department to another. So he's supposed to try different departments. Well, yes.

And this, but what happened was he was assigned to engineering to follow. in this phase of his internship, he's following O'Brien. Miles. And so, O'Brien is now sent to recoup those, because they don't know their death squad is waiting for them. They just think they're going to go grab engineering stuff, equipment. So he's still in the same internship. That's Mike, I guess that first scene is he was helping Miles.

He was helping Miles already at the very beginning. He is now Miles assistant for this phase of his internship. That's how I validated it, at least. We don't know, going back a scene or two, When Aaron shows up with a rifle and he's there for the trip. Yeah. From Colum's reaction, we don't know if this is a surprise or this is what he expected, what Column expected. Okay.

And that's fine. That's fine. But again, I ask myself, why is Nagin this episode? He's there. He's a lovely color. He helps with comedy and he helps with attention, absolutely. But what's the logic of why he was assigned? What's the logic of putting him in?

Right. Right. Forgive me, why pay an actor to be in an episode where he's not really needed? Yeah. Yeah, I don't know. It's not clear. That is definitely a small, you know, ding on this episode for me is I did feel a bit confused of what Nog's role was. At moments he felt like Miles' assistant handing him tools, at other moments, he's walking around guarding the perimeter,

with a rifle in his hand, which feels like security. I'm not really sure what his assignment is. Right. But he's great. He's great. He's fine. Aaron does a very good job. And he's growing as an actor and is at Ferengi.

I'm very happy to see what they did with him as a Ferengi. But I asked just now, before I asked the question, it occurred to me, why is he there? Yeah. That's a valid question. Yep. Well, we cut inside this airlock and we get our first feeling. of this haunted house from Mike Vahar. It's kind of a weird floating shot.

You hear creaking sounds. In the dark. I love the lighting on this. Yes. So good. Yeah. We hear a banging. We see Garrick in a spacesuit, which by the way,

those spacesuits, I think, were built for next gen for one of their movies. One of the next gen movies. Was it for first contact? Maybe for first contact. then you guys used him on DS9 and I wore maybe the same suit that Garrick is in here. I wore that in an episode with Roxanne and I floating in space, the same exact outfits. Oh. You recognized it.

Oh, yeah. It had his name on the rest. It said McNeil. But he hits a few buttons, wakes up the whole thing. The power comes on, the chambers. Lovely shot of the lights coming on in the station. Yeah. Even the little detail, I will say when the lights come on in the stasis chamber room, there's video monitors.

And the video monitors come on, but they fritz. They have like snow on them for a second. And then they sort of settle into some, you know, normal look. But there was something that felt very kind of retro and, you know, horror movie or, you know, it was cool. It was cool. Yeah, the stasis chambers come to life. So does a Cardassian, though, is lying in the Staceous Chamber. You see a close-up of the eyes opening, and he's now awake.

So then the runabout docks, we cut inside a hallway, I guess, or the promenade maybe of this station. And Garrick welcomes them. They're coming off of... Runabout? Yeah, they're coming off the runabout from the docking entrance, whatever that is. Yeah. Eric welcomes them to M.Pok Nour and Miles assigns the teams in this scene. This is a big techno-babel speech. He assigns the teams into must-havs, could do with, and would be nice.

Yes, exactly. As soon as he was dividing up these teams, I was like, oh, they're going to die. He's putting the people we know together and the people we don't know separate. Oh, they're going to die. Which, by the way, is not a bad thing that we're anticipating the death. Like, narratively, maybe it's not a bad idea to kind of know, oh, they're the tropes of the sacrificial characters that are. Yeah. So then you're even more nervous waiting for how are they going to die? How are they going to die? Yeah. I didn't think anyone was going to. I thought people were going to be injured.

I didn't think people were going to die, die, die. Oh, they die died. They might as well have coughed. You know my rule about coughing. Right. They all should have I'm Pichetti I'm a morrow You're dying

You're dying You're dead I did like this montage Of all the teams Moving through Before Garrick finds the goo Yes Great montage

Like often we've seen montages On track shows Back in the day And they're pretty generic And they don't really Move the story forward Very well

This was great It's set up this the gave the ship of personality i thought yeah what was the goo to you guys the good when i first saw it uh just goo later on i sort of knew where it was but it's it's the uh it doesn't make sense actually but but it's the serum that that the soldiers the dardacians soldiers were infected hello okay but why it's a substance like like paste on a on a on a stairwell as opposed to an injection a liquid because a one would assume that they were injected with the serum yes as opposed to it being something substantial that that could

stick to a stairwell right which is how which is how garrett touches it okay it's on a stairwell and that's the infection point right here that's right yeah because he taught he puts it on his hand and then Later on he starts itching, he starts itching his hand and then he starts itching his neck and it starts spreading. Okay, okay. But it's, I didn't like consciously make sense of this before, but now that we're talking about it, it would have been better if that goo was inside one of the broken chambers and he sees it, you know, because then you would have bought, oh, it was goo that the pace that, I don't know. Right.

It would feel connected to those soldiers. Like maybe in the broken chamber? Remember the broken one? Yeah. He's investigating that and he touches that. Yeah. Okay. Yeah.

I think it would have been better to be connected because being randomly lying on a step of a stairwell. Right. And that's why I didn't know what it was at all. Even after finishing watching this episode, I still didn't make the connection until Armand said, that's the stuff that made him go cuckoo. Yeah. Okay. All right.

Yeah. I don't know how I got there. I actually prefer it being something we don't know what it is because it didn't, I didn't realize it, Gary, either until I saw this episode a second time, but then I put it together. But I like the fact that it's just something he picks up.

Randomly. And that, especially after O'Brien has told everybody, don't touch anything. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. Yeah, but they do go into the infirmary, the M. Pachnor infirmary. They see the stasis tubes. Garrick

lifts up a lid. He sees a skeleton a desicated corpse of a skeleton there. Right. And right there. Lifting the lid, the bottom of the lid has the blue gel on it. They could have done it. That would have been a better place to me to put that goo. Yes.

But Bacta sees a regimental kind of ornament, metal or something, a badge. Badge. A badge. A badge there. Garrick knows this regimen. Garrick looks around very smartly. He clocks that this activity on these days. Tubes is recent.

So there's been something happening recently. Eric is a smart guy. He's a smart character. He is. And Bokta notices the regimental badge because he knows that Bichetti is going to be so happy because Bichetti is someone who collects. He's a collector of actually all these type of military badges and emblems. He loves this kind of thing.

He gets him killed later on. He sees the plaque or something on the wall. Oh, my gosh. Bichetti. we go out in a in a corridor yeah this is o'brien working on on a coil spanner he needs a flux capacitor he's working on something in the panel I love this more techie probably you just had flux capacitor flux coupler no yeah yeah yeah it's a time machine that's from back to the future you got to get you got to get the techno babel right I'm sorry I did but I thought this

I made a note to myself here. At this point, I already feel like this is the best shot making I've seen in DS9. Wow. Really? At this point, I made that note. Wow. Mike Vahar is off the charts with the way he's shooting this. And this was still early on.

Yeah. I couldn't agree more. His shot making is extraordinary. Yeah. Wow. It really is. And he took a very familiar set. which is the promenade and the rest of the station and made it very spooky.

I mean, they're using our set. There's no doubt about that. It's a redress of your set, but I did not feel I was there. No. That's right. No. And he shot it in certain ways. He saw the station in a different way than any other director has ever seen the station.

I agree. And if it was any other director, this episode could have gone south very quickly in terms of... 100%. Yeah, we could have been like, well, that's stupid. You know, and that doesn't look right. But, oh, everything is... here was so suspenseful, such a good job. He kept us guessing all the time. The entire time. He had no clue. Well, uh, Nog forgot the flux capacitor or coupler. He forgot that. So he's got to run

back to the runabout. And after he heads off, Garrett calls O'Brien and says, Miles, can you come down to the infirmary? There's something you should see. And I made a note to myself, why does every character say this? Captain, you need to come down here. There's something you need You should see. Just tell them. Just tell them what it is. Why? And everybody goes.

Like when you get that call in Star Trek, you're like, okay, I'll be right there. That's the thing. No one ever says, well, what is it? They all say, on my way, on my way, on my way. No one ever questions it. Yeah. You're right. That's the Star Trek way, though.

You just tell them, come and see it. Yes. Odo, I think you should come down here and see this. On my way. Okay. I'm coming now. Yeah. Because they had nothing else to do.

Exactly. day after I did. Maybe that's why I made the note, because I was like, wasn't Miles saying, let's get this done and get out of here, like, quick? Yeah. And now he's abandoning this thing. Yeah. Come see whatever it is you want to show me.

Yeah. He heads down. And then we cut to the airlock where Nog has gone to get the flux coupler, not capacitor. And we see the DeLorean actually moving away from the station. Yes. You see the time machine floating away. Oh, God. Yeah, he does see the runabout, though, kind of drifting out into space and then suddenly it explodes.

And I've much credit to Aaron Eisenberg. And his line really, really? I agree. That's not right. Yeah. I thought he could have fallen into the trap of making it really very comic, which God bless Aaron he didn't do. No. Yeah.

Yeah, I agree. He did that very well. It was so grounded, so natural. He's, he's a, he was a good actor. Yes, it was. Which he never believed. That's too bad. Really?

So we had lots of conversations. Seriously? Yes. Yes. Oh, all right. All right. We go back to the infirmary. The whole team is there.

I did like Poshetti's line when he talks about these Kardashians that woke up. They're all getting informed about the stasis chambers and that there's Cardassians running around. Pachetti says, well, you know their motto, death to all. So it's definitely starting to feel like a horror film at this point. The security team is not scared one bit. They're a little cocky, I might say. Maybe we should call them or something.

Yeah, very cocky. Not worried at all, which just reinforces my theory. They're going to die. Okay. Amaro kind of jokingly says, well, maybe we should send smoke signals to get out of here because our tricorders don't work. And Miles says, wait a minute, it's not a bad idea. And he techno babbles his way into we could do this and this and some techno smoke signals.

So he sends Pachetti to do something. He's going to die. I know Pachetti's going to die. I did think Miles is a very steady boss in this scene. And generally, I liked his cool, his calm, his pace that Cullum gave it. He's always like that, whether he's in charge of a team or not. charge of a team. He's always steady. He's always cool about things. He never, he never overacts ever, ever, ever. It's incredible. Yeah, he was very good in this. I liked, I liked the way that he kept,

it almost added to the suspense and the horror movie tone because he was, he almost went a little more grounded than usual, slowed down just a little extra. Because he had remember the technical Babel. Yeah, probably. O'Brien's saying those directives. Feschetti, you go down to the habitat ring. Stoltsoff, you go with him. Boktai, you realign magnetic flow. Amaro, you watch his back. He's basically Oprah saying, Fichetti, you're going to die. Boktai, you're going to die. Boktai, you're going to die. Stolti, you're going to die, you get to die, everyone get to die. Okay. Exactly. That's what that's seen is.

Exactly. We go to Cargo Bay and Garrick and O'Brien are there. Garrick doesn't think that Stolzoff was right. Yeah, he doesn't think that that makes sense. I also noticed his hands were itching. Was he already itching it there? He started itching. Wow. God, I've got to watch this again. Yeah, good tracking for

Andy to start little stuff like that. It's just here, a little itch on the hand. Yeah. But Nog decides, while Garrick and Miles are talking, Nog decides to go check the perimeter. He's checking around some of the cargo

containers. And I like the fact that the conversation continued off camera while we were with not oh that was quite brilliant wasn't it brilliant i never seen that happen before no ever we'll see again i just love the bravery of that i did too i can't imagine what burman thought when he saw i thought that's brilliant and i'm never seen that before yeah because what it does is it tells the audience that these guys aren't paying any attention to nog and nog is eat all by himself and in danger and because when you see him looking around you hear the conversation off camera and then you see that there's a cardassian trailing nog and you're like oh no no gnaug's going to get killed he's all by himself now that was

the biggest no no for me in the episode it's a small no no but it's it's so the frangy are as I said earlier in our podcast can hear things really well. Yeah. So you're going to tell me that he, Nag didn't hear someone entering that space? He would have. He would have. I mean, especially since in another episode,

a little further down, Garrick hears someone moving around and he clocks that. You're not going to tell me that that Nog didn't hear that. He did hear that. So that's just a little no-no. And I went, It hadn't occurred to me, but you're absolutely right. You're absolutely right.

Yeah, he should have heard that. Ornog should have been doing something else or... Yeah, and all he's doing is moving the gun around. And it's strange. The moment it happens to all the security people, the moment that they have to move or talk, they pull it back like this as though, oh, I'm out of danger now, as opposed to, you know, holding it. That's funny. It's sort of like guns out, now my line.

Now guns out, now my line. Exactly. Okay, okay. I see what you're saying. Well, just as Nog is about to get killed by this Cardassian soldier, O'Brien calls him and says he needs help with a phase discriminator. And Nog heads back to safety. So close call there for Nog. Okay, so we're at the promenade.

There's the engineers. Well, it's Pachetti. It's just one it. One engineer and one security. And that's a slight problem for me in this episode. I didn't really get the differentiation between who was security and who was engineering. Eventually, I got it because the security is carrying the guns. But I didn't see the differentiation.

I wanted to know more about that. And I didn't. Yeah. Well, this is the one time where gold serving is both security and engineering. is problematic in a way of separating the two. Yeah, it was hard, even from the beginning, it was a bit hard to tell. And in that great oner we talked about, because you just see the four of them together. And I wasn't really sure.

Who was who? Who was who? I thought they were all engineers, to be honest. Me too. Me too. Yeah. So maybe in that oneer where they were, I've forgotten how you say the Bolian's name. Bacta, when he went back to talk to him and said, booby traps, I wish then it could have been,

it could have been delineated that who was security and who was engineer. Okay. I think that might have been the chance to do that. And there may be some other chances. But anyway, that was a slight problem for me. Who's got what job? Yeah, I agree. Well, we've got one engineer, Pichetti here.

We've got one security stoltz off. He's working away when they hear a noise up above. a turbo lift door opens, nobody's there. And he questions their security. He says, is that thing aimed at me? Yeah, that's a rifle. She says, don't worry. It's on safety.

And I thought, wait, you know that there are people out there that are out to kill you. Yeah. You've got the gun on safety. Yeah. And you're pointing it at your buddy of all pointing at you. One place you shouldn't be pointing it. Security 101. Yeah.

Great suspense beats. They go over and flank the door down. below to when it opens they count one two three they jump out nobody's there so all of that is no dialogue it's just mike vahar it's music it's shots it's lighting it's the suspense of i remember director said to me once he goes the the the key to uh horror or suspense is you go i'm going to scare you no i'm not i'm going to scare you no i'm not i'm going to scare you no i'm not i'm going to scare you yes i am yeah yes i am or something like that it was like but i was like oh yeah it's the setup and so that's where we're at here it's like it's a set you know there's a noise i'm going to scare you

they go over they look in the door nothing's there they decide to split up security stole stuff goes upstairs he heads back to work very tentatively he's got his light in the dark you know that dark hallway and then he shines the light up and he sees a plaque. And he's like, oh, yes. Yes. What does he say? He's in heaven. It gives us shadows of the Kardashian moving around.

Yes. Which I thought was quite good. Yes. Yeah, he goes to grab some kind of insignia plaque or something off a wall. And the glass panel is shattered as the Cardassian dives through, which that's very unusual for Star Trek, is to kind of have these glass, like have that kind of practical stunt, you know, crashing through a window. It was, it scared me. Did not expect it.

Wait a minute. The insignia is in a glass case. Is that what it's in? And then there's another piece of glass next to him that he comes through? I was a little confused, honestly. I think the insignia is just hanging on the wall. Oh. Yeah.

Okay. It looked to me like a, like a something he was going to go take the insignia off the wall. It's a plaque. it's a It's mounted Or a banner Or a banner It's mounted to the wall

He can pull it down And then the glass case Is next to that That's where The Cardassian crashes through Okay Yeah I don't know the logic of it

But I like the crashing glass To me it was just scary You know And unexpected And Stolsoff up above Here's it She calls to O'Brien But before she can

Tell him what's up A second Cardassian passing grabs her and throws her over the rail. Two great stunts in the sea. Mm-hmm. And that looked nasty, the fall from the throw over the rail. Good, good stunt work there. Miles comes running, finds Stolsoff's body and Pichetti's remains.

A little time has passed. They're covering Pachetti's body with sheets. And Bokta is freaking out. He's scared to death. Mm-hmm. Miles says, we got to get out of here. We've got to split up again. And if we don't, we're not going to get off the station.

Bokhta's sort of panicking. Miles says, okay, I'll send Garrick with you. And Garrick refuses. And now he's getting really itchy, Garrick. He's itching his neck, scratching his neck and stuff. And Amaro draws his gun on Garrick. Garrick says, I'm not going to go with him. I got other things to do.

Amaro puts a gun on him. Miles kind of says, stand down, let him go. But because he says, I'm going to go, my plan is to go after the Kardashians. I'm going to hunt them down. That's his plan. Which is how he played the game, right? Didn't he say that when he was playing that board game with Nag? Like, go on the offense, be aggressive.

That's right. Cotra. Yeah. Cotro, yeah. Garrick invites Miles to come with him. He talks about, well, you're a killer, too. So I love this little thread. Maybe this is what they were talking about adding to the script.

I'm sure that's what it is. I'm sure that's what it is. Yeah. Why don't you come with me? A few Cardi's. He uses the derogatory name for Cardassians. And, you know, Garrick's kind of baiting him a little. Yeah.

What Garrick is saying is, you're like me. I have these feelings inside of me. And Miles is saying, no, I'm not. And in a sense, this is what the writers, to me, what they're saying is humans have the capacity to not be killers. They may have to do that in war when you're a soldier, you do things. But they have the capacity to say, no, that's not like us. Where are there lots of episodes actually where aliens like myself will say, no, this is what humans do. But in this episode, it's not true.

Right. Right. What I got is that we all of us have that dark capacity, darkness inside. All of us, whether you're a Kardashian or human or Vulcan or whatever. We have these things inside that are potential for darkness. Right. And Miles is saying, no, I can. overcome that. Yeah, exactly. And he does. He does all the way through the episode.

So Garrick goes to go on the offensive and Bokta says, you know what, I feel much better for some reason now that I know Garrick's going after the Kardashians. So a little hint that, okay, maybe we're going to get out of this. Maybe this is going to work out. We cut into Garrick trying to get the computer to give him access to what's going on here, where these Kardashians might be, and he's just getting denied over and over. Access denied, access denied. A great shot. Garrick's back is to the camera,

and the camera is whooshing in behind him as he's going, access denied, access denied. And then it wraps around. Another beautiful Mike Vehar moment that could have just been cut to a close-up of Gary. Right. That's right. But instead, you feel the energy of his urgency

and his desperation and it pushes and wraps around. It's great. Great, great, great. This is also a point where I feel, felt that Andy did such a good job with, because the lines are just very basic. Access denied is what he's saying over and over again. But just the way he said it gave me that sense of something's happening to him now. He's about to, he's losing it. He really is. And it was so subtle, but still very, very good job by Andy Robinson in my estimation. And then he clocks the sound

of the Kardashian nearby. Yeah. That cocking of his head was awesome. It was like, I'm ready. Yeah. He clocks the sound, but he also takes a moment and thinks strategically. What he's going to do. And continues saying access denied. Access denied. He doesn't stop. But it's so creepy at this point.

It's starting to get very creepy. Yeah. We cut over to this soldier who's sneaking in, comes in, looks around no Garrick. He walks around all of the stasis chambers and the camera plays this all out in one shot. He doesn't. He's looking for clues, the soldier, but he doesn't know where Garrier. is he passes the one of the stasis chambers and suddenly Garrick pops up with a with a gun in his hand looking for me it's great shoots the guy and then he looks at the weapon and he's like

that felt good yeah just that line which is what you're talking about here something's something's happening right now yeah we go back to the cargo bay i did notice mike veyars he's he's kind of set up a pattern here of the way he's transitioning and shooting scene to scene. So he's starting with people moving. There's always, they're doing something. So the camera's moving. So here, you know, Nag is moving through the cargo bay. He's talking, you know, why, why does Garrick keep bringing up Setlik 3? Hands off to Miles. Great shots. Great shots. And he's talking about Satelik 3 when Garrick appears and says, oh, don't be modest. You did a lot of killing. And Miles, many, mentions these doors were locked. How'd you get in here? No, a Nog says that. Or Nog says that, right. Nog

says the doors were locked. How'd you get in? And Garrick says, oh, secure is just a relative term, which I thought was an interesting exchange of like, you're not secure anymore. Mm-hmm. You know? It really is. None of you were secure. Oh, yeah. But Garrick talks about he took a tissue sample of the soldier. He just killed one of the soldiers, took a tissue sample, and he finds out that they've been giving this, given this, uh, psychotropic drug that is designed to amplify the Cardassian xenophobic tendencies. And he guesses that maybe they were trying to motivate their troops to be more vicious fighters or something.

Ultra soldiers. Yes. Which then reminded me of the analogy, we're not the analogy, but the parallel during World War II, when Hitler asked Bayer. I think, one of the pharmaceutical companies in Germany to come up with a drug that would make their troops fight like berserkers. He said, this has got to be the most fierce fighting group ever. So Bayer was like, okay, we came up with it. Here it is. And they gave it to a test group of soldiers.

And they came up with the opposite formula. Instead of being aggressive and angry, they were all about love and just, you know, know, not fighting. And what they came up with was MDMA or ecstasy is what they came up with. Really? Yes, which is now the drug of choice of euphoria for people that are going to raves and music festivals, whatever, you know, so it was the exact opposite. So instead of being these, that's what the Cardi's needed. What? The Cardys needed. Need a little bit of MDMA.

Yeah, just hug it out. Just hug it out. Yeah. But anyway, that's what I was thinking about, where the experiments that were done in Germany when I learned about this bit. But what kind of threw me was, how did Garrick have time to, A, take the tissue sample, go to a lab, analyze it, like he did all that stuff and that shows up? I mean, he was in the infirmary. That's where those stations were. Okay, so he just did it all there then. Yeah.

That makes more sense. I think it was all there. Yeah. How wonderful that Garrick and Taylor knows how to do that. How wonderful is it that the cadet not. can pilot the ship. Exactly. Isn't that fortuitous?

Yes. Well, we know Garrick is a lot more than a tailor. That part didn't surprise me. But nog piloting did surprise me. Did you notice at the end of the scene, Miles goes, you look different. Yes. Something about you doesn't look quite the same. Miles can see it.

We go to an empty corridor. This is one of my favorite, another one of my favorite shots. So it starts with Bokta and Amaro in this tableau, this like symmetrical tableau of Amaro pacing and you see Bokta's legs down on the ground. And then it sort of dollies through a wall as they continue talking and gets to this little slit where you see Bokta down on the ground. And then suddenly a hand comes into frame and itches and the rack focus to the foreground. Beautiful opening shot.

Suspenseful telling a story. not just getting into close-ups. It was a home run. Such a great shot. And the itchy hand was Garrick, who's now sneaking around, maybe going to kill our bully in Bokta and his buddy, my cocktail. We don't know that yet.

Yeah, we don't know that yet. We don't know that yet, but it feels that way. It feels creepy. Mm-hmm. It feels creepy, yes. Bokta is telling us a story about a suit that he got from, from Garrick, which I thought was very funny.

I bet he got angry at Garrick. He shouldn't have done that. Knowing who Garrick is. But you would have thought that anybody on this station, especially someone with Federation, would have known. They would have known the rumors. Come on.

Yes. Maybe I shouldn't have yelled at him and gotten so mad. Yes. The conversation continues. Amaro's talking about how Stozov was his friend and how he underestimated her when they were at the academy, they were sparring, and she basically knocked the wind out of him. So this conversation goes on while the tension is constantly building as the second soldier is now sort of kind of.

Yeah, Garrick sees another soldier there. So he kind of hides. The soldier gets to Bacta. Well, Bacta asked for a, he asked for the flux capacitor, right? And so that's when he turns, that's when Amarro turns away from Bacta. And that's when the Cardassian comes in strikes. and basically just pull, I think what he does is he pulls him out and just stomps on his neck is one of the nests, right? Very quick.

Yeah. And as he's straining, you do hear the cracking of the neck and he dies right there. And it looks like to me, Amaro, the way he played it was that he was a deer in headlights. He was frozen. Remember that when he's got, he's just standing there and it was actually, it's actually the soldier. The soldier's about to kill him. Did he kill him? Garrick kills the soldier, shoots him in the back.

Right. But why didn't Amaro shoot him? I mean, Marl's security. He should have. Marl's holding his gun at him, isn't he? I don't think his gun was up. I think he just turned and he's like a deer. No, his gun was up. I think Gary is right. I think I remember correctly, the gun is up. Yeah. But Amaro did play it sort of like a deer in headlights. Like, oh my God, I'm really like he's never been in combat before in a way. So and that's possible too. You know, he may be on deep space night. Oh, that's true. He would have been in through the ringer already. So again, Why is he deer in headlights like that? But then again, the story would not continue. I don't know if he had his gun. I thought he put the gun down to, he had the tool. He had the flux capacitor because they were right. Maybe he would have to take it right. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yes.

Put his gun down to get the tool and then he's just sitting there with the tool in his hand. Right. So it wasn't the gun. Okay. Garrick shoots the Kardashian soldier and then comes over and takes the tool from Amaro. That's right. And he slips around, right. He goes, I borrowed this from Michael J. Fox.

and now I'm going to stab you with it. Yes, exactly. You're right. You're right. That makes more sense because I, Robbie, it looked like to me that he held the gun. A weapon. But if he turns around, he's holding the flux capacitor like that, it looks like he's holding the weapon. It did look like a weapon.

Okay. Thank you. Thank you. And it is a weapon because Garrick comes and takes him. He turns into a weapon. Oh, my gosh. But that was a shocking moment to see Garrick. Stab him like that.

this guy. Like you realize, oh boy, it's Jekyll and Hyde. Exactly. That's what I thought at that moment. It's exactly what I thought. Yeah. It felt like the monster has been released. Yeah.

We cut to Miles, tries to reach them, but can't reach them back in a corridor. Amaro is lying down dying. And there's blood coming from Amaro's mouth. And I was like, why is it? I thought that too. And I thought, well, it's internal injuries. The blood is coming through the rest of the That sometimes happens

Is that blood will come out the mouth Even though the wound isn't from the mouth It's just internal injuries And the blood is coming interesting I'm glad it makes sense Because to me it was a little like Did he punch him? Why is he bleeding from the mouth?

But he dies He tells Miles That it was Garrick that stabbed him And then he dies And Nog just doesn't understand It's like why would why would Garrick do this? But Miles is on a mission.

We got to, you know, find him and protect ourselves. Yep. Back in the infirmary, Miles puts it all together. It's this drug. Nag wants to reason or send a message or do something. And Miles says, no. In the Ferengi culture, Ferengi don't kill. Interesting.

And this may be the first of this. This may be the first of this idea bubbling up in this episode. And so I thought, yes. Nag's instinct is not to kill your enemy, but negotiate with your enemy. Yeah. It's interesting because he even says that later. He says, is he dead? As if it's, that would be horrible.

Not just because we knew him. I'm saying it the very, I'm jumping around storywise. Yes. And even here, he said, you know, why would he be, why would he try to kill us? It's an antithetical thought for a for a farangi. Yeah. And then later, O'Brien says, come on, we're going after Garrick. And now goes, you mean to kill him? Like, even there, he's questioning it. That's great. That was that knowledge that Ferenghis don't kill is, it's important here. Yeah, it's very important. Oh, back in the infirmary, yeah, Miles has put this together. It's the drug. And Miles says, you know what we need to do. We need to act like Garrick said. Go on the offensive. We have to think like a Cardassian. Garrick was right. Yeah. we're going to kill Garrick if we have to. So off they go.

But do we really believe that? No. I mean, at this point, Garrick is a series regular. Yeah. I mean, we're not going to kill Garrick. No, but it's so cool that, you know, O'Brien says, okay, we got to be like that Kotra game and go on the offensive. And then the next shot is Garrick finding the Kotra board in the Impakn-Norkemander's office, right?

And that's when he gets on the, that's when he gets on the, the, what I was going to say, the microphone. That's when he starts talking to, to O'Brien saying, I found something here. You're never going to believe it. A contra board. And so he's, and again, it's so creepy. And he's just going through and looking at the pieces.

And again, it's so well, it's so well placed. And that's where, you know, that's where my friend Andy becomes like the zodiac killer. That he draws upon whatever that is inside of him. And I went, oh, yeah, I've seen that before. Right. That's what he didn't want to do. That's what he didn't want to do. Exactly. But it's nice because he's he's kind of toying with Miles and Nog and talking.

And Miles and Nog are now in the offensive. So we intercut back and forth. They're trying to get to the commander's office. Right. We think that there's going to be this big confrontation. And finally they arrive and they kind of split up. Miles says, let's split up. You know, you go through ops.

and the main entrance and I'll go in through the captain's office and wait for my signal. So they come in and Garrick's not there. He's not, they've been talking to him this whole time, but suddenly he's not there. And then we see the door shuts and Miles is stuck. There's a force field. The door shut. There's a force field that will keep him from opening the door. And Garrick now has Nag as a prisoner.

Yeah. So, yeah. This is an unexpected turn here. And he speaks in Katra to him. Garrick says, it looks like I've captured your last piece, Chief. If you went back, you're going to have to take it from me. Yeah, definitely the game becomes a bigger metaphor in this story. Then I bet it was in the first draft of the script.

Yeah. I feel like the game and Miles Setlik 3 storyline. Right, right. That probably was the stuff that got built up later on after notes and things. So we go out to a corridor where Garrick. is tying a nog up near the promenade. He's not tying him up. There's some sort of rubber band around.

Yes. And I go, where did you get that? But it's a rubber band. And I'm not saying that it's like those Pilates bands that you do Pilates with. And it's not, I'm not saying it didn't restrain him. It does restrain him. But I'm going, where did you get a rubber band? A giant rubber band.

You know, like a, like a, the, the Roadrunner cartoons where it's the Acme break glass in case of emergency, break class in case of large rubber band emergency, you need that. And that's what he found it. Well, Miles is telling Garrick in this part of the scene, you can fight this, fight the effects of the drug. It's just the drug doing this. And Garrick is like, no, I love this. I love this feeling. So he's, he's all in. He's embraced it.

assumed by this drug. I mean, he even says to Miles, you're a killer too, admit it. So it's like they're trying, you know, this idea that we have this in all of us. And I think that's the part of the story that the writers amended after the first draft. I think it's this idea that there's a killer in all of us.

Yeah. Except in Nag. Yeah, except Mog. I mean, the bottom line is that he toys with him. He basically makes the Kachra game into a real-life Kachau. game with, because it's interesting. He wanted, he wanted to play Miles at Katra in the beginning before

he's infected by the drug. Because he thought this would be so challenging. And now he's literally playing a life, life game of Katra against O'Brien, where winner is alive and loser dies. And, and he says, okay, so they finally agree to meet face to face on the promenade with zero weapons. They said, nope, no weapons, no weapons. Sure enough. We're not going to have weapons. And they both have weapons. And they both have weapons, of course. I love the entrance when Miles came into the promenade with the bodies hanging almost like some horror movie of like the victims watch they're the audience now or something and that too is a oneer it it uh comes in and i guess they must have swung the bodies in so that the camera didn't notice them at the beginning because it's all one i wonder and then

the bodies just you know one body just yeah and then he sees the others as well i this is the only part that I had a little bit of a nitpick on, I felt that instead of hanging them off of a beam where they're upright, it would have been more interesting if they were upside down hanging from like rafters of the different parts of the second level of the prominent. I would have called my union rip. That's probably why they didn't do it. That's probably why they didn't do it. Okay, fine.

But they do finally meet. Eventually, they both put their weapons down. They have a hand-to-hand fight. Garrick is winning this fight. Miles is about to die basically when Miles hits his com badge and ducks. And the weapons that he put down with his tricorder and his phaser explodes right next to Garrick. And Garrick is knocked out, not dead, but knocked out. Yeah, I mean, he says, you're right, I'm not a soldier.

I'm an engineer. Yeah. Great line. Which is an answer to the idea that we have discussed in the episode that discusses, which is that there's a killer in all of us. You're right. I'm not a soldier. I'm an engineer.

I solve problems with my mind. Yeah, it's great. Very clever line, a good kind of catchphrase line, but also really meaningful in the context of the story. Yeah. So, Nog asks, is he dead? And O'Brien checks on him, no, he didn't kill him. We cut into the infirmary. Bashir's fixed him up.

We see Derek's laying in a bed in a side room there. Miles is just watching, ask if he can go talk to him. But she says yes. He gets over there. Garrick once asks him if he will tell Amaro's wife and family that he's very, very sorry. And he's very sincere in this moment. Oh, yeah. He's very sincere.

And he did a great job. He did, he did, but doesn't make any sense whatsoever. So he's, I mean, why is it there? It's to humanize Garrick, who's just been a horrendous ogre for the last 20 minutes. sense to humanize him to make us understand why he isn't in the brig. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, he was, he was on this drug.

They know why he did it. He didn't take the drug. He didn't go, oh, I'm going to recreationally for fun, take this drug and turn into a monster. It happened to him by accident. It's never stopped anyone being killed before. Yeah. You know, okay, we just saw them. We've seen lots of episodes.

where lots of people get killed. And there are extenuating circumstances, but we never discussed them. But here, here's a series regular. And suddenly all of a sudden, yes, he's humanized by saying, I want to, I want you to talk to Amar's widow. And there is one little thing where Miles says, you know, there's going to be an inquest. And he says, yes, I know that. But as far as I know, the inquest didn't do much of anything. Yeah.

Yeah, I don't think so. I mean, it's interesting to, it's an interesting idea you bring up. What if Garrick had died? What if Miles... That would be... It would be a personal problem. It wouldn't be a federation problem. Garrick is not a member of the Federation.

Yeah. They killed so many people. One other person is not going to make a difference. Especially in this situation. Yeah. And a tally. I mean, they killed off Cardassians in this... And they're just...

They're on drugs, too. Mm-hmm. And yet we don't feel sorry for them. Yeah. Or the Gem hadar or all... Or the Gem hadar. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, an awkward scene between these two because, you know, they've both looked at the dark side and they, they know that each other has been there. You know, I think Garrick can recognize the soldier and what that, what that, that question he kept asking him about. Tell me about Settlic 3. And further, as Miles says earlier in the episode, I just want to get my crew out when answering when Garrick has taken Nog prisoner. Yeah. What was missing for me in this last scene is that I'm sorry, there had to be. some repugnance towards Garrick about the fact that he killed his crew members and put one of his crew members Snog in jeopardy. There should have been some, I can forgive you, but it's hard

for me to do that. Yeah, yeah. I love that. That would have been great. That would have been great. Okay. Let's talk about a theme lesson moral of the episode, Robbie. Yes. My theme lesson moral takeaway is we all have the potential for bad choices so be careful and don't judge others too harshly okay arman what do you have for us um let me just read to what i wrote we can change humans can overcome their basest animal instincts and taking drugs is a bad thing okay that's a good lesson it's a good lesson Mine would be don't visit abandoned Cardassian space stations. That's all. That's good advice too.

There you go. But Cisco did that and that was the beginning of our show. It was. That's true. That's true. Our Patreon, Paul, winner for theme slash lesson slash moral. This episode is submitted by Killian Trap. And that is, don't underestimate the chief.

That's true. Never. Never. We have an honorable mention for theme and moral, and this is from Feroza meta, who says, not having a beta matrix compositor can really be a challenge. That's true. Because they could have replicated everything.

Yes. Yeah, exactly. Oh, my gosh. Okay. All right. Well, that is the end of our recap and discussion of this episode. And just as a reminder, there will be no new episode next week. But the following week, we will be returning with the episode.

in the cards and that will also be with monsieur armin sima man so armin will be with us on that one one please yeah uh really wei uh so for everyone uh who happens to be a patreon patron please stay tuned for your bonus material for everyone else we'll see you in a couple of weeks by everyone by everybody