The Visitor ( episode ) After an accident in the engine room of the " Defiant " apparently claims the life of Benjamin Sisko , Jake lives out his life in an endless quest to locate his father . Summary . Teaser . On Earth , in a house on the Louisiana bayou near New Orleans . It is dark and stormy outside as an elderly Jake Sisko injects himself with an unknown compound before sitting down in front of a fire . Soon , there comes a knock at the door and Jake answers , revealing a young woman , Melanie , looking for refuge from the downpour . After a few minutes of idle conversation the visitor reveals that she , in fact , is a writer and is looking for the writer Jake Sisko . Confirming that Jake is who she is talking to , she cuts to the chase and asks , very promptly , why he stopped writing . Taking a moment , Jake responds that he stopped writing , not because of any reason or recourse , but because of an event that happened to him when he was eighteen years old . His father Benjamin Sisko , had died . Act One . Jake says he had grown extremely close to his father after losing his mother . Apparently , when Jake was younger in the year 2372 ( sometime after Stardate 49011 . 4 ) he lived on space station Deep Space 9 , where his father was the station ' s commanding officer . In a rare event that happens only every fifty years , the Bajoran wormhole was going to undergo a subspace inversion . During this inversion , rare anomalies and temporal fluctuations were going to occur , creating a spectacle that the elder Sisko did not want to miss . Jake was working on a particularly difficult piece of prose at this time and was struggling with it when his father asked him to come along on the to watch the inversion . Jake tried to hole himself away in the crew quarters to continue with his writing , but his father persuaded him to come to the bridge to watch , reminding him of all he ' d miss if he doesn ' t look around once in a while and then agreed to read and discuss what Jake has wrote afterwards . However , suddenly the " Defiant " was rocked when the wormhole began its inversion , causing a malfunction on the " Defiant " s engineering deck . Benjamin went to see to it , followed by Jake , despite being asked to stay behind by his father . Arriving , Jake found the entire engineering crew unconscious and the warp core beginning to go critical from an energy flux . With Jake ' s help , Ben was able to stop the core from rupturing , but as he passed a piece of equipment to his son , the warp core emitted an energy discharge . Jake was pushed out of the way ; however he witnessed his father ' s disappearance , and Benjamin was presumed to have been vaporized by the energy . Act Two . Jake tried to explain what had happened to Dax , who agreed to scan for any anomalies ; however , the scan turned up nothing , and Jake dismissed it as a dream . Meanwhile , the Klingon s were making more angry noises and the Bajoran s , unsettled by the death of their , entered into a defense pact with the Cardassian s . The Klingons were very unhappy at this and everyone knew that if war broke out , Deep Space 9 would be on the front lines . As a result , the majority of the civilian population left the station . Nog had left to attend Starfleet Academy , and Jake found himself feeling more despondent than ever . Kira and Worf tried to persuade Jake to leave , telling him it was the safest thing to do but he refused . Later , at the upper pylon viewport , Kira approached Jake and told him that she knew his grandfather had asked him to live with him on Earth , and that even if Deep Space 9 wasn ' t on the brink of war , she ' d rather he wasn ' t on the station . Jake told her that the reason he was staying was because that when he and his father arrived , the station was a damaged hulk but Sisko turned it into a thriving community and Jake explained that if he left the station he ' d feel like leaving the last part of his father behind . Kira allowed him to stay on the condition that when she tells him to leave , he will . He agreed . A few months later , Jake found his father in a hallway on DS9 and was physically able to touch him . Taking him immediately to the infirmary , they discovered that Ben was caught in a temporal inversion , falling in and out of sync with normal time and disappearing into subspace , unaware of the passage of time . Despite everyone ' s frantic attempt to save him , Ben began to disappear into subspace . Seeing the devastation in his son ' s face , Ben begged his son to reassure him he would be all right but Jake was too upset to answer . Ben vanished , and Jake was left more heartbroken than ever . Jake tells Melanie he couldn ' t bear losing his father a second time . Melanie says she can come back later , but Jake says he is dying , so that won ' t happen . Act Three . Eventually , the situation with the Klingons escalated and Starfleet was forced to turn over DS9 to them . Jake had no choice to leave and could only watch the station disappear into the distance as they left . With no choice but to carry on , Jake moved back to Earth , went to the Pennington School and began writing . Afterward he moved to Louisiana and married a Bajoran woman named Korena and all was well when they met up with Nog , now a Starfleet commander . The Klingons were beginning to let Starfleet ships through the wormhole into the Gamma Quadrant , to see how the Dominion would handle ships coming into their space again . The three met up to celebrate Jake winning the Betar Prize , a prestigious writing award for his collected stories , and Jake seemed happy and settled . One night , Jake was up late working on his newest novel and was discussing allowing Korena , an artist , to design the cover , when suddenly the familiar flash of light came from the living room . Jake and Korena entered to find Ben lying near the couch . Act Four . Starfleet Science was immediately called , and Ben was eager to find out how his son was doing . He was delighted to find that Jake was married and had published two books , achieving his ambition . However , Jake began to get upset at everything his father had missed out on and that he had given up on him , but Ben told Jake that nobody could be expected to hold on for so long , and that he was proud of him and that even though he wasn ' t there , he still wanted grandchildren . Suddenly he vanished again , and Jake was once again distraught . Jake stopped writing , and began studying subspace mechanics in an attempt to get his father back . Korena was initially patient ; eventually , however , Jake ' s obsession cost him his wife . But Jake wouldn ' t let this stop him , and he realized he could get Ben back by recreating the accident . By this time , fifty years had passed and Jake hoped that because the Bajoran wormhole would be inverting again , he could grab his father and get him back into sync with his own life . Nog , now a captain , got the " Defiant " out of retirement and the crew , including Dax and Bashir , went to recreate the accident . However instead of bringing Ben back , Jake was pulled into subspace where he encountered his father . Ben was again eager to find out how his son was doing , but was horrified to find Jake lost his wife and abandoned his promising career in order to try and rescue him . Ben pleaded with his son to get back to writing and to live his life properly , telling him that he shouldn ' t abandon his future for him . Eventually , Jake was pulled back from subspace . Act Five . Back in the present , Melanie asks why he didn ' t go back to writing , and Jake reveals that he had , having been working on more collected stories . He tells her that there wasn ' t enough time left for him , as he is dying . Melanie realizes that Jake ' s father is about to appear , and bids Jake goodbye . Before she leaves , Jake makes Melanie promise to enjoy life and once she is gone he rests in an old chair before falling asleep . Waking the next morning , Jake opens his eyes to find his father observing him . Ben tells Jake how happy he is that he ' s living in the house again and that he got back to writing . Jake asks Ben to read the dedication : " " To my father , who ' s coming home . " " Ben is touched , but Jake explains further ; he ( Jake ) is the link that kept pulling Ben back into normal space ; the sync was like a rubber band . He was the anchor for his father . Sometimes the band would be pulled taut , and during those times before the tension was released , Ben would temporarily rejoin his timeline , but he pulled away again once it snapped back . Once Jake dies , Ben will be lost in subspace forever . The only way to save him is to cut the cord at the time it is most taut , when he is in perfect sync with Jake ' s timeline . If he did so , Benjamin will be shot back to the time of the incident and he could jump out of the way before he got caught in the loop . Benjamin realizes that Jake has taken poison , and is committing suicide . Ben is horrified , and pleads with his son not to do it and that he shouldn ' t sacrifice himself for him , but Jake explained he had to . By doing this , he is saving two lives , those of Ben and the boy Jake was , the boy who needs his father . Ben is devastated as his son dies in his arms . Ben suddenly finds himself back in the " Defiant " engine room , just after he saved the ship . This time he ' s able to dodge the energy discharge from the warp core . Jake is puzzled how his dad knew to get out of the way , but Ben , having seen how much his son was willing to give up in order to save him , can only hug him knowing they now both have a second chance . Memorable quotes . " " You are my favorite author of all time . " " " " You should read more . " " " " It begins many years ago . I was eighteen . And the worst thing that could happen to a young man happened to me . My father died . " " " " I ' m no writer ; but if I were , it seems to me I ' d want to poke my head up every once in a while and take a look around ; see what ' s going on . It ' s life , Jake ! You can miss it if you don ' t open your eyes . " " " " I ' m not sure I could ever get over losing somebody like that ; right in front of my eyes . " " " " People do . Time passes , and they realize that the person they lost is really gone . . . And they heal . " " " " Is that what happened to you ? " " " " No . . . I suppose not . " " " " Benjamin Sisko was more than my commanding officer ; he was the emissary to my people sent by the prophets . But most importantly , he was my friend . " " " " I didn ' t step forward . I couldn ' t . I felt that no matter what I said about him , I ' d be leaving so much more out ; and that didn ' t seem right . " " " " After a few months , things began returning to normal . . . for everybody else that is . " " " " Please don ' t make me leave ; not yet . This is my home . When my dad and I came here , this place was just an abandoned shell . He turned it into something . Everywhere I look , it ' s like I see a part of him . If I leave , I won ' t have anything left of him . " " " I have been more popular with women since I stopped asking them to do that . " " ( In reference to have women chew his food for him ) " " Quark finally got that little moon he was always talking about , and my father , as usual , is making sure it doesn ' t fall out of orbit . " " " " And don ' t think because I ' m not around much , that I don ' t " want " grandchildren . " " " " Let go , Jake . If not for yourself , then for me . You still have time to make a better life for yourself . Promise me you ' ll do that . . . Promise me ! " " " " To my father , who ' s coming home . " " " " For you , and for the boy that I was . He needs you more than you know . Don ' t you see ? We ' re going to get a second . . . chance . " " " " You OK , Dad ? " " " " I am now , Jake . I am " now " . " " Links and references . References . 47 ; " Anslem " ; Bajor ; Bajoran ; Bajoran sector ; Bajoran system ; Bajoran wormhole ; baseball ; bayou ; Betar Prize ; biography ; candle ; Cardassian ; champagne ; clock ; coffee ; " Collected Stories " ; commander ; commanding officer ; " Commodore Hornblower " ; containment field ; Corsican ; ; Deep Space 9 ; ; deflector array ; dermal regenerator ; divorce ; docking pylon ; Dominion ; dom - jot ; dream ; Earth ; Emissary of the Prophets ; engineering ; Federation ; French ; French Quarter ; front line ; gall ; Gamma Quadrant ; graduation ; gravimetric field ; graviton pulse ; holosuite ; ; interphasic compensator ; ion surfing ; Klingon ; Klingon Empire ; Klingon High Council ; latinum ; Louisiana ; Melanie ' s friend ; memorial service ; monster ; moon ; Morn ' s ; muse ; mutual defense pact ; ; New Orleans ; paragraph ; pen ; Pennington School ; Promenade ; Prophet s ; Quark ' s ; red alert ; redfish ; replicator ; Rom ; Saltah ' na clock ; separation ; short story ; sickbay ; ; ; Sisko ' s Creole Kitchen ; slug ; Smallbridge ; Spain ; subspace flux isolator ; Starfleet ; Starfleet Command ; Starfleet Science ; subspace ; subspace inversion ; subspace mechanics ; Takarian mead ; tea ; temporal displacement ; temporal signature ; toast ; warp core ; warp core breach ; warp core ejection system ; warp coil ; ; ; Yoruba mask