star trek - What happens to Odo when he is hit by a phaser?

At the end of Deep Space Nine, Season 2, Episode 23 - Crossover (which takes place in the Mirror Universe) Prime Universe Dr. Bashir is fleeing from Mirror Universe Odo and Bashir shoots him with a Bajoran phaser.

Odo promptly explodes like a water ballon.

My question is, what happens to Odo when he is hit by a phaser? Did he actually die (the others seem to think so ...) should he really have exploded into jello?

One thinks of later episodes where phaser sweeps are used to find Changelings (however, on stun.)

The scene in question ...

Answer

It is specifically mentioned in "Chimera" that metal weapons (in this case a dagger) cannot hurt a changeling. From this it is easy to deduce that other weapons CAN hurt a changeling.

Considering how a phaser works (it fires "nadion particles"), the weapon most likely has an effect on what it hits quite different from the effects of a bullet or other non-energy weapon. Whatever "nadion particles" do when they hit matter that isn't a gas, they obviously would do it to shapehifters too. We see solids die when hit by a phaser beam, but we don't usually see them lose a specific limb or whatever is hit. The effect is apparently common to the entire body hit.

"Extreme Measures" tells us that nadion particles were also tried as a tool to cure Odo's disease (they didn't work). Since the disease affected the entire body it is unlikely the particles were meant to "cut" through a specific part of it. They clearly affected the entire body or at least the body mass surrounding the impact zone.

So clearly Odo died when hit by a phaser set to kill. There is no reason to assume that he didn't. (It was also confirmed by a Klingon on the station.)

Comments

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