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Of course, not everyone on board Deep Space Nine requires an extensive alien make-over. "My character is very human," says Avery Brooks, who plays Benjamin Sisko, Trek's first starring black commander and a single parent. Unlike William Shatner's swashbuckling Kirk or Patrick Stewart's politically correct Picard, Deep Space's skipper is a decidedly tortured soul.

"He's not at peace with himself," Brooks explains. "He's not happy about being assigned to the space station — he doesn't think it's the ideal environment to raise his son. And he still hasn't come to terms with the death of his wife." (She was killed on the starship Saratoga during Next Generation's famous Borg battles a few seasons ago, when the evil space zombies brainwashed Captain Picard and forced him to blow up most of the Federation fleet; Stewart will make a cameo appearance on the Deep Space premiere for a flashback of the incident.)

Other Deep Spacers include Nana Visitor as First Officer Kira Nerys, a hotheaded Bajoran who doesn't trust the Federation (Bajorans look just like humans except for an adorable crinkle of wrinkles on the bridge of the nose); Siddig El Fadil as Doctor Bashir (he's human but specializes in multi-species medicine); Terry Farrell as Lieutenant Dax (she may look like a fashion model, but she's really a Trill, with a 300-year-old sluglike symbiotic life-form snuggled inside her body); Cirroc Lofton as Sisko's son, Jake (a space brat who doesn't even remember life on earth); and Colm Meaney as Miles O'Brien, who has been promoted from Next Generation's transporter chief to Deep Space's chief operations officer.

This mix of characters is designed to open up new plot avenues for the Trek franchise. "Gene Roddenberry (Star Trek's late creator) had a rule on Next Generation that there couldn't be conflict among the show's permanent characters," says Rick Berman. "He wanted a 24th century in which everybody in the Federation got along. But that made writing the show extremely difficult. So we made the Deep Space characters a little less squeaky clean. We've given more of an edge to them. And we've put them in a difficult environment — in a place that doesn't look so much like a TWA waiting room."

Back at Quark's after lunch, our alien entourage prepares to resume the party. A makeup woman rubs K-Y jelly into my prosthetic forehead ("It makes it shine," she insists) while a nearby Ferengi is having his nose retouched. I do more alien shtick for the camera for a few hours, then turn in my asparagus suit, sit down in the makeup chair, and let them transform me back into an earthling. "So?" the K-Y woman asks. "You ready to give up your day job? Ready to become a full-time alien?"

Maybe — but only if I get a side order of hollandaise.