While accompanying Gul Dukat to his first hearing on his war crimes, Captain Sisko and the rest of the USS Honsh? are attacked by the Dominion. When Sisko awakens, he is on a planet with his left arm in a cast and Gul Dukat as his only companion. Dukat was able to save Sisko by making it to a shuttle with the Captain in tow. On the surface of a barren planet, their now repaired distress beacon will hopefully send help.
When the Cardassian occupation of Bajor ended in 2369, the mining space station Terok Nor was left abandoned, its systems ripped out. By invitation of the Bajoran provisional government, Starfleet stepped in to oversee the rebuilding and day-to-day operations of the newly christened Deep Space Nine.
The years of Starfleet's nonintervention into Cardassian matters, however, had taken its toll on relations with the Bajorans. Consequently, Starfleet's position was a tenuous one; many Bajorans, suspicious and hostile as a result of decades of Cardassian oppression and brutality, did not greet the Federation's presence with open arms. The Federation's assistance is put to the test as DS9 becomes a center of travel and commerce that stretches into the Gamma Quadrant.