Commander (now Captain) Sisko (Avery Brooks) was assigned to Deep Space Nine after the Cardassians abandoned their occupation of Bajor and the Bajoran provisional government asked for help in governing the station. Reluctant at first to accept due to the death of his wife three years prior, Sisko undertook the assignment and now, the station is the most strategic point in the Federation, due to a handily positioned wormhole to the Gamma quadrant.
Sisko is also the Bajoran Emissary to the Prophets, the mysterious aliens who live in the wormhole. Over time, Ben has come to accept this position, and even actively participate in it.
Leeta (Chase Masterson) is a Bajoran Dabo girl at Quark's bar. She met Bashir there, and the two started to date. During this period, she participated in Dax's zhian'tara, becoming host to one of the past personalities.
Leeta was one of the main supporters of the Union Rom started for workers in Quark's. This was when she began to respect Rom.
When, in a Bajoran ceremony on Risa, she and Julian split up, Leeta set her sights on Rom. When he didn't seem interested, she nearly left DS9 to live with Dr Lewis Zimmerman, but stayed when Rom admitted he loved her. The two are now married!
Lt Cmdr Dax (Terry Farrell) was a Trill, a species that exists under a symbiotic relationship where the humanoid host and the slug-like symbiont share consciousness. The Dax symbiont has lived for hundreds of years and more than 8 lifetimes. One of those lives was Curzon Dax, former friend of Sisko, a fact which has caused the commander some discomfort in the past. He still refers to Dax as "Old Man". Jadzia Dax,
this incarnation, was the science officer aboard Deep Space Nine.
She met Lt Cmdr Worf on DS9 and eventually, the two were married and she was accepted into the House of Martok. They were even going to have kids, but a Pagh Wraith (inhabiting Gul Dukat's body) cut short her life, tragically. But the symbiont was saved...
Doctor Julian Bashir (Alexander Siddig, formerly Siddig el Fadil, or Alexander Siddig, depending on which season you watch!) arrived on the station as a graduate fresh from the academy. Now Chief Medical Officer, Bashir finished second in his class at the academy. He only missed first place by mistaking a pre-ganglionic fibre for a post-ganglionic nerve in the oral
exam. Dr Bashir harbored a not-so-secret desire for Lt Cmdr Dax who continued to refuse his advances until she dies. Julian accepted this and the two were very good friends.
It eventually transpired that Bashir was genetically enhanced as a child. He was so slow that his parents broke the law to give him a chance in life. Though this should ban him from serving in StarFleet, his father volunteered to go to prison to keep his son in service.
"Constable" Odo (Rene Auberjonois) is Chief of Security
aboard Deep Space Nine. He is a shapeshifter, a changeling, who was found years ago in the Denorios belt, a charged plasma field where the Bajoran wormhole was later discovered. He spent many years in a lab being studied by Bajoran scientists until
a Cardassian named Gul Dukat drafted him into police work where he has been employed ever since. Odo has learned that his people are the Founders of the Dominion, a brutal force which has enslaved almost the entire Gamma quadrant. They turned him into a solid when he killed one of them, but he regained his shapeshifting nature from a dying Chageling.
Odo is currently dating Colonel Kira Nerys.
Minor Characters:
Gul Dukat - This is the former prefect of the station Deep Space Nine, which the Cardassians called Terok Nor. He was forced to give it up and is unhappy about it - especially in light of the fact that a wormhole to the gamma quadrant was discovered near it, making the station one of the most strategic points in the Alpha Quadrant. Gul Dukat commandeered a Klingon Bird of Prey which he cruised the galaxy in before going back to Cardassia as liaison between his people and the Dominion.
Elim Garak - A plain and simple tailor (yeah, right!), Garak is a former member of the Cardassian Obsidian Order, currently in exile on DS9 where he runs a clothier's. He has formed fairly close relationships with Odo and Dr Bashir and was romantically involved with his hated enemy's daughter (Dukat's half-Bajoran child Ziyal) before Damar slaughtered her.
