TP: Raise the Dawn by DRGIII Review Thread (Spoilers!)

[Mike Winters]

Relayer1 wrote:

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One question : who is the new Emissary - Kira or Vaughan ?

Neither. Sisko was the Emissary, plain and simple. Kira was/is the Hand of the Prophets which was the title she was given in Warpath. Vaughn to my knowledge has no title or special standing with the prophets and probably acted as an orb shadow.

Mike

[Relayer1]

lvsxy808 wrote:

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Especially since Vaughn is now full-on flat-out dead.

You are a lot more convinced than I am !

[RPJOB]

Most death in Trek is like the 72 hour flu. It takes a bit longer but most recover, especially if you're a major character.

[Relayer1]

But (unless I missed something) Vaughan wasn't killed. Sure, his body died, but his conciousness had vacated that months ago.

His 'essence' was last seen saving Kira wasn't it ?

[Mage]

Relayer1 wrote:

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But (unless I missed something) Vaughan wasn't killed. Sure, his body died, but his conciousness had vacated that months ago.

His 'essence' was last seen saving Kira wasn't it ?

Which makes me wonder.... did the Prophets hold on to that last bit of Elias just to save Kira when she needed to be saved? And then let him go? It wasn't untill that happened that his body finally passed away. I think we have seen the last of Elias, atleast for now and the future. There are still plenty of decades worth in which he worked as a SI operative, just think of the amount of stories that can still be told about Elias Vaughn, the SI agent.

[Mage]

You know, I only just realized that DRGIII has, with his last three novels in the 24th century, been responsible for the death of quite a few big Trek characters namely:

Elias Vaugh
Joseph Sisko
Kira Nerys
Sela

I did the spoiler tag since there are still people who haven't read it yet.

In any case, some might consider two of these to be in a state between death and somewhere else (), but I doubt we'll see one of them ever again. The other, perhaps....

[Ood Sigma]

No way Kira is dead. I mean, if she was, then what was the point of having Vaughn cling to life for so long and come to her rescue?

Pretty much the same thing that happened to Sisko at the end of WYLB, happened to Kira. She may be absent from "reality" for a while, but I'd count on her still having a role in the saga of DS9. Maybe not in the next book, or the one after that, but she'll be back, in my opinion.

[Enterpriserules]

Ood Sigma wrote:

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No way Kira is dead. I mean, if she was, then what was the point of having Vaughn cling to life for so long and come to her rescue?

Pretty much the same thing that happened to Sisko at the end of WYLB, happened to Kira. She may be absent from "reality" for a while, but I'd count on her still having a role in the saga of DS9. Maybe not in the next book, or the one after that, but she'll be back, in my opinion.

I agree, I do think Kira will be back

[Christopher]

Yeah, if I recall right, Vaughn died in physical reality and had only an echo/Orb shadow inside the wormhole... but Kira was actually, physically inside wormhole space when the entrance closed off. It's a totally different situation. There's no reason to think she's dead any more than Sisko was dead when he was trapped in the closed-off wormhole in "Emissary."

[Mage]

Perhaps that's why I added a wink in my post?? I didn't want to go to deep into it, because of not wanting to add spoilers. But since that has happened now, I might as well add my two cents.

I certainly believe Kira is not dead. She is most definatly with the Prophets. However, right now, I'm not so sure if she's coming back or not. I kind of have the feeling she might actually stay with them for the long run. Don't why, a gut feeling.
I do however, believe that Vaughn is dead. Some people may feel he could return some way, since his essence saved Kira. But I really think that's it for him.

[Markonian]

I hope Sela isn't dead either. Somewhere within this ice cold being must be her Humanity but the books generally depicted her as incapable of a full heel-face-turn. Although Indistinguishable from Magic was the first book in a while to make her sympathetic, Imho.

[Sci]

Markonian wrote:

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I hope Sela isn't dead either. Somewhere within this ice cold being must be her Humanity but the books generally depicted her as incapable of a full heel-face-turn. Although Indistinguishable from Magic was the first book in a while to make her sympathetic, Imho.

I see nothing to be gained from reversing DRGIII's decision to kill her off in Raise the Dawn, and would view it as a pointless reset button.

[Relayer1]

Sela was rather one dimensional and had outlived her usefulness - glad to see the back of her.

[DS9forever]

^ So am I. Why the Romulan Praetor trusted her in the first place I don't understand.

[DGCatAniSiri]

Markonian wrote:

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I hope Sela isn't dead either. Somewhere within this ice cold being must be her Humanity but the books generally depicted her as incapable of a full heel-face-turn. Although Indistinguishable from Magic was the first book in a while to make her sympathetic, Imho.

That was actually one of the things that made the character of Sela so interesting to me. She walked into the Enterprise conference lounge, lays out her life story, and then tells Picard "never doubt" that she is fully Romulan, when, on his part, all he has is her word that she even is Tasha's daughter and that her outlandish story is true, that she is not a piece in some greater Romulan plot. He had no reason to doubt in the first place, but she had to say that. It was a story thread that seemed to be begging to be picked up on, but TNG never did and quietly swept Sela aside.

That said, though, I can't really picture her character arc ending differently. She was stuck in that moment that she called for the guards, got her mother found out and executed, and made her choice to be nothing but Romulan. That moment defined her life, and she couldn't move past it. More, she refused to. If she had, it would have been her admitting that she was wrong about the Federation, that she had made the wrong choice to embrace her Romulan heritage and shun all things about her that was human. That was the whole point of her 'patriotism.' Her actions were made on the basis of 'if we do not balance the field, the Federation, the humans, will use their advantage and wipe us out.' If she admitted that she was wrong, that the Federation wouldn't take that step and make a preemptive strike on the Empire, then she would be admitting that there was something about the Federation that was better than the Romulans, that they were genuine in their beliefs and attitudes of peaceful coexistence, and that meant that she had made the wrong choice in getting her mother killed and staying with her father and the Romulans. That was why being sent to the Federation was her fate worse than death - it would have been coming face to fact with the fact that she was wrong.

Given the set up, I can't picture her story ending differently. I found her intriguing enough that I would like to see an alternate storyline where she comes to accept her humanity, but I can't see how the story of Sela as told here could have ended differently.