Stardate 52576.2: On a visit to Bajor, Captain Sisko is taken for a trip to Kendra Provice, where he eyes some land that is so beautiful to him, he purchases it, bringing himself one step closer to living on Bajor. Meanwhile, the Colonel brings word that the I.K.S. Rotarran and I.K.S. Koraga had been attacked in the Badlands by the Dominion. The Koraga is destroyed and only six escape pods are retrieved. The Captain of the ship, Lieutenant Commander Worf, is not among the survivors found.
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.