"I am a Jem'Hadar; I have pledged my life to the glory of the Founders, and I give it to them gladly, for I am a Jem'Hadar. Obedience brings victory; victory is life. That is the order of things..."

At last, a little, parodistic crossover, merging Great Mouse Detective and Star Trek, brought to you by me; I am pleased to introduce the adventures of Star Trek: Titus:

With their menacing, orcish appearance and rigid bearing, the Jem'Hadar are, rightfully, the most feared creatures of the galaxy. Bred in hatcheries, they were genetically engineered to be the ultimate killing machines — requiring no food, no sleep, no sex, and no relaxation. They live only for battle! The only form of sustenance required is an addictive drug called ketracel-white, which contains a key isogenic enzyme deliberately omitted from their biology. Without regular intake of an isogenic drug, their blood chemistry collapse from the withdrawal, and they go mad and eventually die, destroying every living creature in their path before turning on themselves. Jem'Hadar dependence on ketracel-white provides the assurance of total obedience to their Vorta supervisors and particularly to the xenophobic Founders (Changelings), whom they revere as "gods."

First Marata'klan is an "Honoured Elder," a title awarded to the few Jem'Hadar who live to the age of twenty, who was conceived in a birthing facility on Borthos III in the Gamma Quadrant, where he served at the command of the treacherous and manipulative Vorta Selsar. He rose from the lowest ranks carefully, adopting a sagacity of uncompromising obedience and unswerving discipline in his duties that was unique even for a Jem'Hadar, which impressed Selsar. Marata'klan, as the rank of First, commands the Jem'Hadar unit under Selsar, whom he follows blindly, if undeservingly, without question. Because it is the order of things. That is his life purpose; his very existence, and he gives it freely to the Dominion. And he knew his place — and Selsar liked that!

Commanding the flagship Taran'talar, Selsar became the chief administrator of all Dominion forces in the Beta Quadrant in an intergalactic war against the United Federation of Planets, as First Marata'klan would successfully come to led massive occupation armies against the planets of Bolarus, Coridan, Axanar, among others. However, in an unanticipated shift of power, the Federation sealed the entrance of the Bajoran wormhole, cutting off Dominion reinforcements and, more importantly, their supply of ketracel-white from the Gamma Quadrant! And the Dominion began to breed new kind of Jem'Hadar soldiers, specifically designed for combat in the Alpha Quadrant, whom the Founders regarded as superior to original "Gammas." Marata'klan, as a "Gamma," was relegated to the rank of Second to much of his humiliation, as a younger, brassier "Alpha" named Xatan'talon was elevated over him as the new First, which created a considerable amount of friction between the two counterparts.

Doubt and worry crept into Marata'klan's mind, as he secretly began to question the legitimacy of the Dominion and his ways of his people:  The Jem'Hadar, as a race, are slaves — unchanging and unchangeable. Their lifespans short and volatile, expendable as individuals, their numbers replaceable. They remain completely reliant on the Dominion for everything. They have no purpose without them. They have no chance of survival without them. They have no form of society, of culture, of government, or of independent thought. They have no identity; they are feral! They are a race that cannot change, that cannot develop and evolve as other sentient beings do. Marata'klan, like all Jem'Hadar, will die out and die forgotten.

(Hurrah, I have brand-new pair glasses! No more broken ones, with yucky tape, blech! I chose actor and fitness trainer Clark Bartram because he's an intimidatingly huge muscle-man who can actually act — how rare is that! He was an excellent Batman in Sandy Collora's fantastic independent films, Batman: Dead End and World's Finest!)

Models - Clark Bartram | Alien Models - Jem'Hadar

Medium - 2B mechanical pencil.

Marata'klan © Diane N. Tran.
Based on Star Trek created by Gene Roddenberry.