Best of Star Trek: Deep Space 9---Nor the Battle to the Strong

"Nor the Battle to the Strong" is the 4th episode of the 5th season and was written by Rene Echevarria.

Jake is writing a story about Dr. Bashir for an article he's working on for his school. He ends up getting more than he bargained for when the doc answers a distress call from an outpost under siege by Klingons.

Jake ends up playing medic in a facility undergoing the usual shakes, rattles, and rolls of an underground bunker during wartime. He witnesses sever injuries, self-inflicted wounds, and casualties that at the very least make him lose his supper and sleep, to running away from explosions when he and Bashir attempt to get the generator from the runabout.

Riddled with guilt and shame, he has a breakdown while Bashir suffers through guilt of his own for making Jake be apart of it all instead of taking him back to the station first.

Jake gets his mojo back though when faced with two Klingon warriors coming charged with full-on phaser blasters and hellbent on destroying the place. He grabs a phaser and shoots randomly to ward them off and ends up bringing the entrance down with a ton of rock on the warriors.

This episode shows the ugly and human side of war--the fear, death, and human endurance that comes with it. There's little humor or pleasantness to this episode. It's just gut wrenching and reminds us of what happens when factions can't come to the table and resolve their differences peacefully.

At one point, Jake is left alone with a dying fighter who is cantankerous and gives Jake a reality check---there's no way they will both get out of this alive. Another moment is when Jake meets a soldier who phased his own leg to get out of the fight. He tells Jake how he did really well in the battle simulations, but when it came to the real thing, the instinct for survival kicks in.

"All you can think about is getting away from the explosions" Jakes says, more to himself than the soldier.

It's also a turning point in the series that makes the Klingon Empire, once again, a feared and loathsome enemy of the Federation.

The highlight of the episode comes at the end when Jakes has finished his article and lets his dad read it. He states that the line between bravery and cowardness is very thin and the captain is proud to know that Jake was brave to admit that---something most people in a similar situation would not.