A small, agile Federation combat craft with a crew of one or two, flown by the Maquis in the Demilitarised Zone and by Starfleet fighter squadrons during the Dominion War.
The fighter is a flat, wedge-shaped craft with swept wingtips carrying its weapons. It first appears in the Deep Space Nine two-parter The Maquis, where Cal Hudson's Maquis cell uses such ships against the Cardassians and Sisko pursues them in runabouts. Ro Laren's Maquis group flies them in The Next Generation's Preemptive Strike.
Starfleet uses the same craft in numbers during the Dominion War. In Sacrifice of Angels, Sisko sends waves of fighters against the Cardassian ships in the Dominion line, hoping to provoke them into breaking formation so that the Defiant and the fleet can push through towards Deep Space 9. The Dominion sees the ploy and opens a gap of its own as a trap.