Darth Hideout 🏳️🌈<p>[I started writing this months ago. It kind of trails off. This may become a thread.]</p><p>The Mirror Universe is intriguing because of the opportunities for what-if scenarios, much like time-travel stories. You can sort of understand & explain time travel in terms of causality, even if things become confusing, predestined or contradictory.</p><p>By contrast, the Mirror Universe is, apparently, not causally connected to the Prime Universe in the usual sense. Events in one do not trigger exactly the same events in the other, so plenty of characters can die in one universe but not the other. Jake Sisko can exist in one universe but not the other. On some level it enables more radically different what-if scenarios. Ben Sisko can travel to the MU to replace his dead pirate counterpart, help the Terran cause there willingly & tell Smiley to, “Get out of that chair,” knowing he’s interfering in some sense, just not in his own history, so sure, why not?</p><p>But there is apparently some mechanism other than causality that keeps the two universes in synch in many particulars, right down to the year-old acid stain in McCoy’s sickbay in “Mirror, Mirror.” In 2265, in that episode, four members of the same landing party in each universe switch places in a transporter incident during a magnetic storm. They all seem to have the same names, ages, appearances & genetic makeup as their counterparts. Being the same age as one’s mirror image means the mirror parents must have reproduced around the same time, perhaps even on the same date, but in radically different circumstances & yet produced exactly the same genetic result. Kirk’s Mirror service record indicates he assassinated Capt Pike to gain command of the Enterprise. But he succeeded the same predecessor, possibly on or around the same (star)date.</p><p>Then, Kirk gives his, “In every revolution there is ONE MAN,” speech to Mirror Spock and wrecks the whole Terran Empire, dooming Mirror Terrans to generations of slavery under the Alliance. Prime Kirk alters the course of Mirror history. Or you might say he did if it were a time-travel script. But who’s to say what might have been in the MU absent Kirk’s meddling? Mirror Spock said the Empire would fall in a couple centuries anyway, but it would have outlasted DS9. Does the Prime Directive apply here? Mirror Directive?</p><p>Yet one hundred years later, on Bajor, Kira Nerys & Bareil Antos are both born at the same time as their Prime counterparts, along with Elim Garak on Cardassia, a bunch of Ferengi, Terrans, Vic Fontaine (apparently born in the MU, constructed in the PU), Jadzia & Ezri (Dax is a good question here), etc. They all have the same names.</p><p>In Abrams Trek you can understand the similarities and differences to the original timeline because the point of divergence is relatively recent. But over time, the histories will naturally diverge further & further until there is little left in common. An Abrams Trek script set 1k years in the future could not show much resemblance to the original timeline without a lot of explanation.</p><p>In the MU, despite Kirk interfering a hundred years earlier, some force keeps reflecting the same people from the other universe no matter how much the circumstances differ. At least you have to assume some sort of non-temporal causality & on a personal level. It’s not obvious that either Jadzia or Ezri is joined to Dax in the MU. But Jadzia seems to have died in the MU around the same time as in the PU, arguably by coincidence. Who’s to say some force of personal causality hasn’t doomed certain others in the PU when their MU counterparts died? Will some interdimensional karma synch up the two universes & soon eliminate Jake, Quark, Rom, Nog, Mirror Bareil, etc, etc? Odo in the PU ran off to rejoin/reform the Founders. “A drop becomes the ocean.” Perhaps he ceased to exist in some important sense? Ben withdrew to the Celestial Temple & was told the end of his path was behind, not ahead. So perhaps he’s going no further forward in time and has effectively died & caught up with the MU.</p><p>The idea of another, parallel universe with opposite versions of the same people also occurred in “The Alternative Factor,” where the opposition is more literal: The other universe is anti-matter. Though the interpretation of how matter & anti-matter interact is goofy, that script includes the idea that the two counterparts can never meet. In the MU, Bareil can argue with two almost-identically-dressed opposite Kiras at once, while the two Lazaruses always switch universes & can only come into contact between the two. Characters in the Prime & Mirror universes become well aware of their doppelgangers & are often eager to meet them.</p><p>Eventually “The Emperor’s New Cloak” takes the concept to absurdity when Zek decides to do business in the MU.</p><p><span class="h-card" translate="no"><a href="https://a.gup.pe/u/allstartrek" class="u-url mention" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">@<span>allstartrek</span></a></span> </p><p><a href="https://c.im/tags/StarTrek" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">#<span>StarTrek</span></a> <a href="https://c.im/tags/StarTrekTOS" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">#<span>StarTrekTOS</span></a> <a href="https://c.im/tags/StarTrekDS9" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">#<span>StarTrekDS9</span></a></p>