SF Debris's thoughts on Sisko's real mother?

[Yukaphile]

Indeed.

[Yukaphile]

Hell, now I'm having a funny mental image of Sisko sitting down Sarah Prophet to try to explain how babies are born and tell her how rape is wrong.

[Deledrius]

Well, let's look at it this way. What does, say, adding the story of Moses do to further Superman's story? In many cases, it has led to truly epic interpretations where he is here to lead by example and let his leadership inspire us to save the Earth, as he learns more about his origins and incorporates that into his experiences on Earth.

I think this misses the point. I didn't say "I don't see what his divine birth adds" wondering if one could tell a story around this plot point. I'm suggesting that, given we have the entire story, it did not add anything to that story. They introduced a last-minute complication to his character for seemingly no reason and failed to even address the ramifications of it in any meaningful way. There were a few lines of dialog between Ben and his father about it, and then it was all over and accepted and not relevant even when they kept using the Sarah Prophet to speak to him.

It feels like it was only there because, during the conversion of the Wormhole conflict into a Judeo-Christian theology, someone felt they should throw in a divine conception as well.

Could it have gone somewhere deep and insightful? Certainly. Did it? Not that I recall.

[Yukaphile]

That was Season 7 in a nutshell. It felt very rushed and fatigued. Hell, someone recently brought up how Laas should have appeared sooner, he could have added lots more storytelling possibilities. And there's Ezri. Imagine if she had had time to grow as a character like Bashir?

[Meushell]

The Prophets don't even understand how linear time works; I can't imagine their understanding of what humans do and do not like being done with their bodies is much better.

The problem there is that she had to live as a convincing human for years. That has to come with understanding them to a degree. We also know from previous episodes that when a prophet or pah wraith is in someone, their minds are connected. Sarah would have been mentally screaming how wrong it was, only to be ignored.

[Yukaphile]

Well, they are timeless, so from "their" perspective, that could have easily been a "billion years" after meeting Sisko, on their "non-linear time" plane.

@Meushell OH GOD THAT ADDS ANOTHER LAYER OF HORROR.

[Admiral X]

Watching the first episode, it really doesn't make any kind of sense that Sisko or the prophets meeting him was in any way planned. This was a meeting of aliens who couldn't be much more alien to each other, and it comes off as Sisko's ability to think on his feet and do the whole explorer thing combined with his deep pain over the loss of his wife was what interested the prophets in him. If everything had been planned, the prophets would have already known who and what he was.

[BunBun299]

One thing I will say in defense of this. Someone has to play Devil's Advocate in this, so might as well jump on the grenade. But when Kira was possessed by a Prophet (forget the episode title), the Prophet was asked why it was possessing her, it replied that she was willing.

Now, we saw three people possessed by Pah'Wraiths that I can recall. Keiko O'Brien, Jake Sisko and Dukat. Of them, only Dukat acted as a willing host. Keiko and Jake were clearly unwilling victims. But the only time we ever saw a Prophet possess a mortal to interact with the corporeal, they picked someone willing to do so.

Given this, I think it is entirely possible that Sarah was a willing host to the Prophet. Perhaps she was already dying when it found her? A terminal disease with Star Trek medicine is unlikely, but possible. So maybe the Prophet offered to extend her life by a few years in exchange for being mother to the Sisko. This would explain why she was dead by the time Sisko's father tracked her down.

Still, I do think if this was what the writers had in mind, they should have said something in the show. Overall, I think they came up with something they thought was a cool idea, "What if Sisko is an actual demigod?" But they didn't think the idea through like they really should have.

[Yukaphile]

Then why did she leave the second she had her body back. Why didn't she tell Joe Sisko instead of fleeing the moment she was back? Sisko flat-out accuses the Prophet of possessing her, and speculates Sarah had never been the one to love Joe, and the Prophet didn't deny it. That rules out any possibility she was willing, or she'd have told Joe. And if she really was dying of a terminal disease, then why did she flee to... was it Australia? I think it was, I forgot. She obviously lived long enough to have a bit of a normal life until he tracked her down. And hell, IIRC it was a train accident or something that killed her, wasn't it? That the Prophets may have done deliberately like the Q killed Amanda's parents. So Sisko would never find out. Moreover, Kira was willing because the Prophets are A) Close to Bajor, closer than they are to Earth, and B) That Kira is a Bajoran and believes in the Prophets, while to Sarah they were probably just aliens.

[Deledrius]

But the only time we ever saw a Prophet possess a mortal to interact with the corporeal, they picked someone willing to do so.

Given this, I think it is entirely possible that Sarah was a willing host to the Prophet. Perhaps she was already dying when it found her? A terminal disease with Star Trek medicine is unlikely, but possible. So maybe the Prophet offered to extend her life by a few years in exchange for being mother to the Sisko. This would explain why she was dead by the time Sisko's father tracked her down.

They had her leave the moment she was no longer possessed, IIRC, which strongly implies that this was not voluntary or at least the consent had been rescinded. I don't recall the exact wording of the scene and don't have time to look into it at the moment, but it seems I'm not the only one remembering this being the situation as presented.

They could have done it your way, and I think it may have solved these problems nicely without requiring much more work, but instead we're left with the distinct impression that the story was not a happy one. I suspect this was an oversight and not an intentional reading, but it is what it is. The truth is, her character wasn't needed in the story beyond what they perceived as her short, physical role in his gestation and birth, so she was discarded by the plot after. It also neatly explained her absence in the previous six years as well as the lack of mentions. A sore subject makes a convenient excuse for covering an otherwise-important character's neglect.