History Recap / StarTrekDeepSpaceNineS04E24TheQuickening

While on the mission in the Gamma Quadrant, they receive an automated distress signal from a planet on the edge of Dominion space. When they beam down to investigate, they find a ruined city and people with bluish lesions on their faces. They then encounter a woman with red lesions who collapses in agony in front of them and begs to be taken to Trevean. They carry her to Trevean's hospital, where she's taken away. Trevean explains that everyone on his world, Teplans, was infected with "the Blight" by the Dominion as punishment. Victims have blue lesions and may live for years or decades before the lesions "Quicken" and turn red, indicating an impending, painful death. Mothers pass down the disease to their children, and everyone dies from it. Bashir and Dax, however, are at no risk.

To Bashir's horror, he discovers that Trevean is not a doctor so much as a euthanizer, whom residents visit when their Blight quickens to receive a painless death. Bashir and Dax offer help in finding a cure and try to recruit test subjects, but no one seems interested. Trevean accuses them of peddling false hope, but they find their first volunteer in Ekoria, a pregnant mother who wants to live long enough to give birth. As they set to work, Kira warns them that the Jem'Hadar patrol this area and will be back in about a week, so time is limited.

Bashir's quickly whip up an antigen and begins treating the Teplans under his care. But as he makes some routine scans, his Quickened patients' symptoms progress rapidly, forcing Trevean to come and ease their passing with toxic cocktails. Bashir realizes that the disease reacts to electromagnetic fields, an intentional design from the Dominion to prevent the Teplans from rebuilding their civilization. All of Bashir's patients save Ekoria are dead, and time is up. Bashir is despondant, but Dax convinces him that there still may be a cure. He resolves to stay behind as Dax and Kira return to the station.

Bashir cares for his only remaining patient, the pregnant Ekoria, who is now in the initial stages of Quickening and wants to survive just long enough to give birth. Trevean believes that he's making Ekora suffer needlessly. He offers her his mercy, suggesting that her child could die "knowing only peace" rather than suffer the Blight, but she refuses. A few weeks later, Bashir induces labor on Ekoria and she delivers a baby boy without any of the blue lesions of the Blight. Bashir realizes that the antigen he has created is actually a vaccine that helped Ekoria's son fight off the Blight. Ekoria, finally realizing that her son will not suffer from the disease, dies in exhaustion.

Trevean and his group of healers are astonished as to what Bashir was able to accomplish. Bashir agrees to help Trevean to manufacture the vaccine and Trevean himself makes it his new mission to ensure the vaccine is administered to every pregnant woman on the planet. The Teplans begin to celebrate the first child born free of the Blight but Bashir stands away from the Teplans, not feeling like celebrating. Back on the station, Sisko gives Bashir his commendations for helping the Teplan people, but Bashir does not feel the accolades are deserved. The next generation of Teplans may be able to be born free of the Blight, but the people already suffering will continue to die. As the episode ends, Bashir runs his computer through simulations of the virus's progression trying to see if there is something he missed in his quest to help the Teplans fight the horrible disease.

* {{Determinator}}: Ekoria, now in the stages of Quickening, is determined to survive until her child is born, even refusing Trevean's "treatment", and enduring suffering up until the birth of her son and her death.

* PregnantBadass: Ekoria. Let's face it, she's a {{Determinator}} who resolves to fight this disease until her son can be born. While she still dies, she ultimately knows that her son will be free of the Blight.

* BreakTheHaughty: Bashir goes down to the planet expecting to have the blight fully cured in just a few days. Boy, is he wrong. By the end of the episode when the first baby born free of the blight is presented to the populace, Bashir wants nothing to do with the celebration, and prefers to stand off to the side. Later, when Sisko is offering his congratulations, Bashir sharply retorts that he doesn't deserve any.

* CruelMercy: This planet resisted the Dominion, and as punishment the Jem'Hadar infected them with blight that they couldn't cure, had a hundred percent infection and mortality rate, and will eventually kill the victims at a random point in their life. To top it all off, the virus is made worse in the presence of electromagnetic fields, meaning that the Teplan civilization had to renounce technology and revert to medieval standards to just survive. Thus, instead of simply killing their enemies outright like they usually do, they condemned the populace to die a slow death.

* MandatoryLine: Sisko doesn't appear until the final scene. Worf, O'Brien, Quark, and Odo only get a couple of lines in the teaser. [[note]]Rene Auberjonois directed this episode.[[/note]]

The episode starts out with Kira, O'Brien, Odo, and Worf confronting Quark about illegal advertisements that were inserted into Deep Space Nine's computers. The most egregious would be replacing all the cups in the replicators on both the station and the Defiant with mugs advertising Quark's bar, with a jingle from Quark's bar playing every time someone took a drink. Kira delivers an ImpliedDeathThreat to Quark: she is about to leave for the Gamma Quadrant on a mission with Dax and Bashir, and if these advertisements are not removed from the station and the Defiant, then there will be some "fun" going on at Quark's.

While on the mission in the Delta Quadrant, they receive an automated distress signal from a planet on the edge of Dominion space. When they beam down to the planet to investigate, they find a ruined city and people with bluish lesions on their faces. They then encounter a woman with red lesions who collapses in agony in front of them. As she dies, a man explains to Dax and Bashir that this civilization is infected with something known as "the blight". The Starfleet officers are taken to a clinic where a local doctor, Trevean, explains the origins of the blight. This civilization, referred to as the Teplans, were once a very advanced civilization. But when the Dominion were expanding to the area and attempted to subjugate them, the Teplans attempted to resist. It ended poorly: not only did the Jem'Hadar destroy most of the major population centres, the Dominion infected the planet with a virus which is now known as the Blight. It progressed so rapidly and infected everyone to the point that all Teplans now have it, even from birth as the virus is transmitted in-utero. Born with the blue lesions on their faces, when these lesions turn red, it means that the disease has "quickened" in them meaning that they have reached the stage where the disease will ultimately kill them in days. Trevean is revealed to be a palliative-care doctor of sorts: when people quicken, Trevean administers a blend of herbs that quickly kill those who have quickened so that they do not suffer the horrible agony that is prevalent in the disease's terminal stage. The distress signal that Dax had discovered is from an automated beacon from 200 years ago, from when the Dominion first invaded.

Kira has been monitoring a Jem'Hadar patrol in the area and notes that they need to leave as soon as possible. However, Bashir feels that he can do something to help the Teplan people. To that end, Kira agrees to hide in a nearby nebula for a week, while Dax and Bashir try to see if they can do something for the Teplans. With the help of a local pregnant woman named Ekoria, Bashir sets up shop at her residence and sets out to do his work. They immediately isolate the virus that causes the Blight and Bashir synthesizes an antigen that he uses on a group of volunteers eager to see Bashir at work, including Ekoria. Trevean warns Bashir of prior people who have promised cures to Teplans only to deliver nothing. Bashir refuses to promise anything but Trevean warns the group of volunteers that they will require Trevean's services soon enough.

Trevean soon proves to be correct: the group of Teplans start to suffer horribly while lesions develop suddenly in front of Bashir's eyes while during routine scans. Bashir realizes that the electromagnetic fields from his instruments are allowing the disease to progress rapidly and it dawns on both Dax and Bashir that not only the disease was designed to be fatal, but it forced the Teplan civilization to abandon technology just to survive. Now aware of the group of dying volunteers, Trevean administers toxic cocktails to all affected patients to stop their suffering. Only Ekoria remains of the group of volunteers, the rest now dead.

Bashir is despondent: he was so confident that he would find a cure so quickly but didn't realize that the Dominion had engineered the virus in this fashion to make it so difficult to even eliminate, much less treat. Just as he is about to give up, Dax tells him that just because Bashir couldn't find a cure, does not mean that the Blight is incurable. When Kira returns to the planet, Bashir resolves to stay behind and will send a signal to Deep Space Nine when he is ready to be picked up.

Using primitive tools available, Bashir resolves to care for his only remaining patient: the pregnant Ekoria, who is now in the initial stages of Quickening. He resolves to help her to at least ensure that her child is born. Trevean meanwhile wishes for Ekoria to seek his "treatment", noting that her child is likely infected with the blight in-utero and that death would be preferrable to living in suffering, but Ekoria refuses. A few weeks later, Bashir induces labor on Ekoria and she delivers a baby boy without any of the blue lesions of the Blight. Bashir realizes that the antigen he has created is actually a vaccine that helped Ekoria's son fight off the Blight. Ekoria, finally realizing that her son will not suffer from the disease, dies in exhaustion.

Trevean and his group of healers are astonished as to what Bashir was able to accomplish. Bashir agrees to help Trevean to manufacture the vaccine and Trevean himself makes it his task to ensure the vaccine is administered to every pregnant woman on the planet. The Teplans begin to celebrate the first child born free of the Blight but Bashir stands away from the Teplans, not feeling like celebrating. Back on the station, Sisko gives Bashir his commendations for helping the Teplan people, but Bashir does not feel the accolades are deserved. The next generation of Teplans may be able to be born free of the Blight, but the people still suffering will continue to die. As the episode ends, Bashir runs his computer through simulations of the virus's progression trying to see if there is something he missed in his quest to help the Teplans fight the horrible disease.

Trevean and his group of healers are astonished as to what Bashir was able to accomplish. Bashir agrees to help Trevean to manufacture the vaccine and Trevean himself makes it his task to ensure the vaccine is administered to every pregnant woman on the planet. The Teplans begin to celebrate the first child born free of the Blight but Bashir stands away from the Teplans, not feeling like celebrating. Back on the station, Sisko gives Bashir his commendations for helping the Teplan people, but Bashir does not feel like celebrating. The next generation of Teplans may be able to be born free of the Blight, but the people still suffering will continue to die. As the episode ends, Bashir runs his computer through simulations of the virus's progression trying to see if there is something he missed in his quest to help the Teplans fight the horrible disease.

Trevean soon proves to be correct: the group of Teplans start to suffer horribly while lesions develop suddenly in front of Bashir's eyes while he is running scans on them. Bashir realizes that the electromagnetic fields from his instruments are allowing the disease to progress rapidly and it dawns on both Dax and Bashir that not only the disease was designed to be fatal, but it forced the Teplan civilization to abandon technology just to survive. Now aware of the group of dying volunteers, Trevean administers toxic cocktails to all affected patients to stop their suffering. Only Ekoria remains of the group of volunteers, the rest now dead.

Trevean and his group of healers are astonished as to what Bashir was able to accomplish. Bashir agrees to help Trevean to manufacture the vaccine and Trevean himself makes it his task to administer the vaccine to every pregnant woman on the planet. The Teplans begin to celebrate the first child born free of the Blight but Bashir stands away from the Teplans, not feeling like celebrating. Back on the station, Sisko gives Bashir his commendations for helping the Teplan people, but Bashir does not feel like celebrating. The next generation of Teplans may be able to be born free of the Blight, but the people still suffering will continue to die. As the episode ends, Bashir runs his computer through simulations of the virus's progression trying to see if there is something he missed in his quest to help the Teplans fight the horrible disease.

Using primitive tools available, Bashir resolves to care for his only remaining patient: the pregnant Ekoria. He resolves to help her to at least ensure that her child is born. Trevean meanwhile wishes for Ekoria to seek his "treatment", noting that her child is likely infected with the blight in-utero and that death would be preferrable to living in suffering. Ekoria refuses. A few weeks later, Bashir induces labor on Ekoria and she delivers a baby boy without any of the blue lesions of the Blight. Bashir realizes that the antigen he has created is actually a vaccine that helped Ekoria's son fight off the Blight. Ekoria, finally realizing that her son will not suffer from the disease, dies in exhaustion.

* ArtisticLicenseMedicine: It's extremely premature to call Bashir's antigen a successful vaccine. For one thing, this vaccine was only confirmed to be successful in one person, and while it worked for Ekoria's son, there wouldn't be any guarantee that it would work with other pregnant women, especially those who have progressed later in term than Ekoria has. In addition, a virus like the Blight already existing in the mother's body would likely infect the fetus during the early stages, yet a vaccine administered in the late stages of pregnancy appear to be successful. The episode seems to reference this at the end when Bashir is running simulations on his computer to find out exactly what happened.

** The [=DTaP=] vaccine is an example of a vaccine that is successfully able to prevent infection from Pertussis, which is the bacteria known to cause Whooping Cough, a condition that can be fatal to newborns.

While on the mission in the Delta Quadrant, they receive an automated distress signal from a planet on the edge of Dominion space. When they beam down to the planet to investigate, they find a ruined city and people with bluish lesions on their faces. They then encounter a woman with red lesions who collapses in agony in front of them. As she dies, a man explains to Dax and Bashir that this civilization is infected with something known as "the blight". The Starfleet officers are taken to a clinic where a local doctor, Trevean, explains the origins of the blight. This civilization, referred to as the Teplans, were once a very advanced civilization. But when the Dominion were expanding to the area and attempted to subjugate them, the Teplans attempted to resist. It ended poorly: not only did the Jem'Hadar destroy most of the major population centres, the Dominion infected the planet with a virus which is now known as the Blight. It progressed so rapidly and infected everyone to the point that all Teplans now have it, even from birth as the virus is transmitted in-utero. Born with the blue lesions on their faces, when these lesions turn red, it means that the disease has "quickened" in them meaning that they have reached the stage where the disease will ultimately kill them in days. Trevean is revealed to be a palliative care doctor of sorts: when people quicken, Trevean administers a blend of herbs that quickly kill those who have quickened so that they do not suffer the horrible agony that is prevalent in the disease's terminal stage. The distress signal that Dax had discovered is from an automated beacon from 200 years ago, from when the Dominion first invaded.

Kira has been monitoring a Jem'Hadar patrol in the area and notes that they need to leave as soon as possible. However, Bashir feels that he can do something to help the Teplan people. To that end, Kira agrees to hide in a nearby nebula for a week, while Dax and Bashir try to see if they can do something for the Teplans. With the help of a local pregnant woman named Ekoria, Bashir sets up shop at her residence and sets out to do his work. They immediately isolate a virus and Bashir synthesizes an antigen that he uses on a group of volunteers eager to see Bashir at work, including Ekoria. Trevean warns Bashir of prior people who have promised cures to Teplans only to deliver nothing. Bashir refuses to promise anything but Trevean warns the group of volunteers that they will require Trevean's services soon enough.

Trevean and his group of healers are astonished as to what Bashir was able to accomplish. Bashir agrees to help Trevean to manufacture the vaccine and Trevean himself makes it his task to administer the vaccine to every pregnant woman on the planet. The Teplans begin to celebrate the first child born free of the Blight but Bashir stands away from the Teplans, not feeling like celebrating. Back on the station, Sisko gives Bashir his commendations for helping the Teplan people, but Bashir does not feel like celebrating. The next generation of Teplans may be able to be born free of the Blight, but the people still suffering will continue to die. As the episode ends, Bashir runs his computer through simulations of the virus's progression trying to see if there is something he missed in his treatment of the Teplans.

Trevean and his group of healers are astonished as to what Bashir was able to accomplish. Bashir agrees to help Trevean to manufacture the vaccine and Trevean himself makes it his task to administer the vaccine to every pregnant woman on the planet. The Teplans begin to celebrate the first child born free of the Blight but Bashir stands away from the Teplans, not feeling like celebrating. Back on the station, Sisko gives Bashir his commendations for helping the Teplan people, but Bashir does not feel like celebrating. The next generation of Teplans may be able to be born free of the Blight, but the people still suffering will continue to suffer. As the episode ends, Bashir runs his computer through simulations of the virus's progression trying to see if there is something he missed in his treatment of the Teplans.

* ArtisticLicenseMedicine: It's extremely premature to call Bashir's antigen a successful vaccine. For one thing, this vaccine was only confirmed to be successful in one person, and while it worked for Ekoria's son, there wouldn't be any guarantee that it would work with other pregnant women, especially those who have progressed later in term than Ekoria has. The episode seems to reference this at the end when Bashir is running simulations on his computer to find out exactly what happened.

The episode starts out with Kira, O'Brien, Odo, and Worf confronting Quark about illegal advertisements that were inserted into DS9's computers. The most egregious would be replacing all the cups in the replicators on both the station and the Defiant with mugs advertising Quark's bar, with a jingle from Quark's bar playing every time someone took a drink. Kira delivers an ImpliedDeathThreat to Quark: she is about to leave for the Gamma Quadrant on a mission with Dax and Bashir, and if these advertisements are not removed from the station and the Defiant, then there will be some "fun" going on at Quark's.

While on the mission in the Delta Quadrant, they receive an automated distress signal from a planet on the edge of Dominion space. When they beam down to the planet to investigate, they find a ruined city and

Bashir and Dax arrive on a Dominion ravaged world, and set to work trying to cure the fatal blight all the populace have been cursed with.

* TruthInTelevision: Bashir standing off to the side as Trevean shows the first blight-free baby to the Teplan populace is in reference to Jonas Salk, the creator of the first polio vaccine. He wanted no credit in its creation and wanted nothing more than to help prevent a disease that at the time, had ravaged millions.

* TruthInTelevision: Bashir standing off to the side as Trevean shows the first blight-free baby to the Teplan populace is in reference to Jonas Salk, the creator of the first vaccine. He wanted no credit in its creation and wanted nothing more than to help prevent a disease that at the time, had ravaged millions.

* RealityEnsues: This episode is a {{Deconstruction}} of a common plot in ''Star Trek''--a long-standing medical problem is cured by the miracle of Starfleet medicine. More likely, a disease that has gone uncured for so long won't be so easily resolved--and indeed, Bashir never finds the cure he hoped to find. He still has more success than anyone before, but the full benefits of his discovery won't be felt for another generation or so.

* CruelMercy: This planet resisted the Dominion, and as punishment the Jem'Hadar infected them with blight that they couldn't cure, had a hundred percent infection and mortality rate, and will eventually kill the victims at a random point in their life. To top it all off, the virus is made worse in the presence of electromagnetic fields. Instead of simply killing their enemies outright like they usually do they condemned the populace to die a slow death.

* CruelMercy: This planet resisted the Dominion, and as punishment the Jem'Hadar infected them with blight that they couldn't cure, had a hundred percent infection and mortality rate, and will eventually kill the victims at a random point in their life. To top it all off, the virus is made worse in the presence of electromagnetic fields. Instead of simply killing their enemies outright like the usually do they condemned the populace to die a slow death.

* BittersweetEnding: Try as he might, Bashir cannot find a cure for those presently suffering from the blight. However, he does find a medicine to prevent babies from being born with it if administered to pregnant women, thus saving the next generation (and those in the future).

* KickTheDog: Simply because the people of this planet resisted the Dominion 200 years ago, the Jem'Hadar [[MakeAnExampleOfThem made an example of them,]] by infecting them with a "blight" that which they are born with and which "quickens" itself randomly in a person's life, creating red lesions when it becomes active, and killing them shortly after in particularly painful fashion. That'd be bad enough, but it turns out the electromagnetic fields from medical instruments (as Bashir learns the hard way) ''amplifies'' the virus, and causes it to mutate. These people must've really, ''really'' pissed off the Dominion.

* KickTheDog: Simply because the people of this planet resisted the Dominion 200 years ago, the Jem'Hadar [[MakeAnExampleOfThem made an example of them,]] by infecting them with a "blight" that activates itself randomly in a person's life, creating red lesions when it becomes active, and killing them shortly after in particularly painful fashion. That'd be bad enough, but it turns out the electromagnetic fields from medical instruments (as Bashir learns the hard way) ''amplifies'' the virus, and causes it to mutate. These people must've really, ''really'' pissed off the Dominion.

* BreakTheHaughty: Bashir goes down to the planet expecting to have the blight fully cured in just a few days. Boy, is he wrong. By the end of the episode when the first baby born free of the blight is presented to the populace, Bashir wants nothing to do with the celebration, and prefers to stand off to the side.

* MandatoryLine: Sisko doesn't appear until the final scene. Odo only gets a couple of lines in the teaser. [[note]]Rene Auberjonois directed this episode.[[/note]]

* BreakTheHaughty: Bashir goes down to the planet expecting to have the blight fully cured in just a few days. Boy, is he wrong...

* KickTheDog: Simply because the people of this planet resisted the Dominion 200 years ago, the Jem'Hadar [[MakeAnExampleOfThem made an example of them,]] by infecting them with a "blight" that activates itself randomly in a person's life, creating red lesions when it becomes active, and killing them shortly after. That'd be bad enough, but it turns out the electromagnetic fields from medical instruments (as Bashir learns the hard way) ''amplifies'' the virus, and causes it to mutate. These people must've really, ''really'' pissed off the Dominion.

* MandatoryLine: Sisko doesn't appear until the final scene.

[[caption-width-right:350:[[TearJerker Ohhh, this one's depressing.]]]]

* WastelandElder: Trevean.