She was silent for a moment.

"The funny thing," she went on abruptly, "is sometimes I can't help wishing I were still with them."

For a moment, I thought she was joking. Then I realized she was telling me the truth.

Abby shook her head. "There was a sense of camaraderie about them, a feeling of belongingness. And they weren't just privateers. Once in a while, they did something for someone who needed it."

I must have seemed skeptical, because her expression became more insistent. "At least," she said, "some of them did."

"If you say so," I remarked.

"In any case," Abby went on, "what's done is done. As you can see, my pirating days are behind me."

I couldn't resist. "Yes," I said, glancing pointedly at the viewscreen. "Directly behind you."

She didn't dignify the remark with a response. Under the circ.u.mstances, I couldn't blame her.

"Steady as she goes," she told Thadoc.

The helmsman nodded. "Aye, Captain."

For the next two days, we sped toward our legendary destination. And all the while, Dacrophus's pirate fleet remained close on our heels, a pack of jackals trailing a lioness in hopes of sharing her spoils.

On the other hand, we encountered no additional obstacles. That gave us ample time to effect repairs to our ship, though it turned out mercifully few were needed. It also gave us a chance to study the warbird's operating systems an exercise that would soon prove useful.

For on the third day after our defeat of the Romulans, we came in sight of the phenomenon known as Hel's Gate.

Madigoor "HEL'S GATE," FLENARRH repeated, savoring the notion like the bouquet of a fine wine.

The Captain of the Kalliope chuckled. "With a fleet of treasure-hungry pirates on your tail."

"And Brant's kidnappers somewhere up ahead," Bo'tex noted.

"No danger of being bored, at least," remarked Robinson.

Flenarrh leaned forward. "What was it like?" he asked, his eyes alight. "The Gate, I mean?"

Everyone waited to hear his answer even the gecko, it seemed.

"Was it everything you expected?" Dravvin inquired.

Picard took a moment to answer. "Everything I expected," he said at last, "and more."

The Tale HEL'S GATE LIVED up to its reputation in every way. It was a dramatic, even spectacular phenomenon and at the same time, a decidedly dangerous one.

The thing's core was a pure, blinding white, difficult to look at even with our screen's light dampers in operation. But the fields that played around it, changing size and shape before my eyes, were quite the opposite. So beautiful were they, so varied in the iridescent hues they presented, it was difficult not to be mesmerized by them.

As I watched, enthralled, a dark red light appeared in the core and discharged itself into s.p.a.ce. It happened again a few seconds later, and yet again a few seconds after that, as if the phenomenon were shooting gouts of blood from a severed artery.

A grisly image, I'll admit. Nonetheless, it was the one that sprang readily to mind.

"There it is," said Abby, unable to keep a note of awe and amazement out of her voice.

I turned to her. "You sound surprised."

She shrugged. "Maybe I am. I don't know."

Then I realized how it had been with Abby. She had been so intent on getting her brother back, so focused on putting together a ship and an adequate crew for that purpose, she hadn't had time to fully consider what she was getting herself into.

And now that she was able to see it with her own eyes, now that it blazed before her with a wild and hideous intensity, it had taken on a reality for which she was unprepared.

But Abby was nothing if not resilient. She turned to Thadoc.

"Any sign of the mercenaries' ships?" she asked.

She was unconcerned about giving away any secrets. After all, there were only four of us on the bridge at the moment myself, Worf, Thadoc, and Abby herself and we were all aware of her search for her brother.

The helmsman consulted his monitors. "No, no sign."

To be sure, there were no mercenary vessels represented on the viewscreen either. But then, with the light display coming out of Hel's Gate, it would have been easy for a ship or two to conceal themselves.

"But they were here," Worf pointed out from the tactical station.

Abby looked back over her shoulder at him. "How do you know?"

My lieutenant frowned. "I've picked up traces of at least three ion trails and possibly more. The traces are faint but unmistakable. And they all lead into the phenomenon."

"Into it," Abby echoed pensively.

But not necessarily through it, I thought. What's more, I suspect I was not the only one completing her comment that way.

"Even if there is a dimensional entry in there," I said, regarding the savage brilliance of the thing's core, "I don't see how anyone could have lived to reach it."

"A point well taken," Thadoc grunted.

I had a sudden flash of insight. "That is," I noted, turning to Abby, "unless you've got something up your sleeve."

She returned my scrutiny without giving away a single emotion. "In fact," she admitted, "I do." She eyed the screen. "The approach typically taken by those who enter Hel's Gate is that they try to negotiate the phenomenon under full power."

"A mistake," I deduced.

"A big mistake," Abby explained, "since Hel's Gate tends to reflect energy back at its source. The key, according to my brother, is to enter the phenomenon under absolute minimum power."

"Without active propulsion," I noted.

Abby nodded. "Exactly. You just coast through it on momentum, at the lowest possible speed."

"Sounds nerve-wracking," I observed.

"And difficult," she agreed, "in that you've got to figure out what the lowest speed might be. But it's the only way through."

Indeed, I couldn't think of any other. I considered the phenomenon anew, weighing what Abby had told me.

"Let's try it, then," I said.

Of course, Abby would have done so with or without my encouragement. In any case, she had Thadoc plot a course and a speed.

"What about the pirates?" Worf asked.

Abby looked at him, a smile finally pulling at the corners of her mouth. "They'll have to figure it out on their own."

The Klingon didn't object to the strategy and neither did I. After all, I had no great desire to remain in the company of Captain Dacrophus and his cronies. And if it took something like Hel's Gate to pry them away from us, so be it.

"Full impulse ahead," Abby ordered.

"Full impulse," Thadoc confirmed, and moved us forward.

"Captain Dacrophus is hailing us," Worf reported.

Abby hesitated a moment. "On screen," she said, obviously no longer concerned about concealing my ident.i.ty.

A moment later, the Yridian's visage filled the viewscreen. "What are you doing?" he demanded.

"What does it look like?" Abby answered evenly and unflinchingly. "I'm entering the Gate."

Dacrophus's eyes narrowed. "Then I'm following. But don't try any tricks, my friend. You'll regret them."

Abby nodded. "No doubt." She cast a glance at Worf. "You may terminate the communication, Lieutenant."

The Klingon complied. The Yridian disappeared, replaced by the violent splendor of the phenomenon.

We proceeded for about thirty seconds on impulse power, Hel's Gate looming before us. Then, hoping for the best, we minimized energy usage on board, cut power to our engines, and entered the phenomenon on momentum alone.

"There," said Abby, leaning back in her captain's chair. "Now we'll see who regrets what."

Over the years I had served in s.p.a.ce, I had developed a great respect for those oddities the universe had thrown in my path. And yet, there I was, arrogant enough to believe we could defy something as fierce and powerful as Hel's Gate and live to tell about it.

I felt like a particularly small and foolhardy minnow offering myself up to the leviathan of legend. And the closer we came to the heart of the phenomenon, the more apt the a.n.a.logy seemed.

Running only on emergency power, we couldn't have provided Hel's Gate with much energy with which to batter us. Yet, batter us it did. The warbird lurched this way and that like a creature in torment, threatening to tear itself apart with its gyrations.

"I thought we would be safe if we cut power," Worf barked.

"There must have been some energy already trapped inside," I responded, grabbing the back of the captain's chair for support. "Perhaps from previous attempts to run the Gate."

"Thadoc," Abby cried out, hanging on to her captain's seat as best she could. "Report!"

"Shields down to seventy percent," the helmsman shouted back, fighting a jolt. "No make that sixty percent. And falling."

The captain turned to Worf. "Can we reduce power any further?"

My officer shook his s.h.a.ggy head as an unnerving shudder ran through the ship. "Not without losing helm and life support."

He'd barely finished when the captain's seat seemed to fly out of my grasp. I had time to recognize that as an illusion, to realize it was I who was flying away, head over heels, before I came up against something hard with bone-rattling force.

Tasting blood, I fought to remain in control of my senses. Raising my head, I looked around and saw the bridge littered with bodies. No not corpses, I told myself, unless corpses were capable of groans and curses. My comrades were still alive.

But no one was at his or her post. And most alarming of all, with Thadoc stretched out limply against a bulkhead, there was no one piloting the Romulan vessel. In a place like Hel's Gate, such a deficit could have proven devastating the difference between survival and being torn into a hundred b.l.o.o.d.y fragments.

In Thadoc's absence, the helm was my post. My responsibility. Girding myself, I grabbed the bulkhead behind me and staggered to my feet. The deck jerked beneath me and I almost went sprawling again. But somehow, I stood my ground, and even took a few steps toward the piloting controls.

Another impact. Another few steps. Impact, steps. By then, I was close enough to hurl myself at the console.

My fingers closed on it just as the warbird whipped me backward again. But this time, I managed to hang on, my muscles screaming with the effort. With an immense application of will, I hauled myself into the helmsman's seat.

My monitors showed me we were still on course, more or less. Making whatever adjustments I could without applying thrusters and adding to our miseries, I rode out the next upheaval and the one after that.

By then, Worf had wrestled himself back into place behind the tactical station. He called to me in his deep, booming voice.

"Are you all right, Captain?"

"Well enough!" I replied, despite the numbness in my side and the ringing in my ears.

Mercifully or so I thought the tremors began to subside a little. One by one, Abby and Thadoc dragged themselves off the deck and came to stand beside me. Unfortunately, Thadoc was cradling one of his wrists. Judging by his wretched expression, he had broken it perhaps in more places than one.

On the viewscreen, the nature of the phenomenon changed. After all, we were no longer attempting to peer into Hel's Gate, speculating on what it could possibly represent. Now, for better or worse, we were fully and irrevocably inside it.

What had earlier seemed like an flawless center of brilliance now showed us its true colors more specifically, striations of midnight blue and neon green and rich umber, running lengthwise along the inside of a colorless cylinder. And it all seemed to tremble with uncertainty, as if it might take on another appearance at any second.

Despite a bruise on the side of her face, Abby smiled. It was a welcome sight, to say the least.

"We're in," she said, collapsing in the Romulan commander's chair.

"So we are," I added.

Our vessel had lost momentum, of course, in the process of entering the Gate. But as I checked my instruments, I realized we were no longer doing so. Clearly, this was a frictionless vacuum, though it was nothing like any vacuum I had ever seen.

Abby turned to Worf. "Status?"

The Klingon checked his monitors. "Shields down to fifteen percent," he reported. "Some of our internal sensor nodes are off-line, but otherwise the ship is functional."

The captain nodded. "Excellent."

"How much longer before we emerge on the other side?" I asked.