Neal James is a space station navigator whose lover, Dylan Teague, left him for a starmapping mission. But when Dylan radios in a distant signal one night, Neal discovers that he hasn't managed to put the relationship behind him in the two months they've been apart. When he's one of the crew members sent to investigate the signal, he finds that his ex-lover feels the same.<br><br>The source of the signal is a lost colony ship. Only a handful of the original colonists remain, survivors of a deadly disease that killed most of their fellow shipmates twenty years ago. To keep the threat of disease to a minimum, the colony adheres to strict laws, including the prohibition of same-sex relationships.<br><br>When the same fatal virus seems to appear again, Neal and Dylan find themselves in the midst of an irrational panic and hate that threatens to destroy everything the colonists have worked so hard to attain.

Operation Starseed

Might be an old relayer stuck on endless repeat and everyone’s


dead, I just don’t know.” He takes a deep breath, lets it out


slowly, and the rush fills my ears, I can almost feel it warm on my


neck, my cheeks, my skin. “That’s the situation. What do you


translated the code?” I ask, trying to ignore the steady sound of


his breathing in my ears. “It’s not alien?”


“Morse,” he says wryly. “Four hundred


million miles away from home and there’s Morse code out in them


endearment and hate myself when I whisper, “Dylan, don’t.”


“Sorry,” he mutters, but I can tell


he’s not, not really. How am I supposed to get over him when he


calls me stuff like that? When he makes it sound like he’s not yet


over me? Then why are we apart again?I wonder. Oh yes,


his mission. He didn’t want me sitting here wasting away, waiting


for him to return. How could I forget?When I don’t answer


Chapter 3