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

attention to the signal. “It’s changed,” she says as Dylan sits on


the arm of my seat. “Last ten minutes or so, right after we homed


in on the source.” Dylan cocks his head to one side and frowns, as


if he’s trying to make out the meaning beneath the staccato bursts


of code. “Nothing to be alarmed about,” Vallery continues, handing


me a log sheet. On it the new message is printed out—a series of


lengthy coordinates pinpointing a course through the Epsilon


system. “I think it’s sort of like a welcome mat, you know?” Dylan


leans against my shoulder to read the message, and despite the


matter at hand I can’t ignore the warmth of his body against mine.


I love him, have I mentioned that? “They know we’re tracking the


signal so they’re making it easy for us, giving us a road map to


“That would suggest it’s not a relay,


then,” Dylan murmurs. Stretching an arm across the back of my chair


Chapter 19