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

As we come around the stern to the starboard


side, we can see the wreckage mentioned in the file—a huge, gaping


hole torn into the hull, cabling like sutures dangling from the


open wound. The rooms beyond are gray, dead, empty. Fifteen people


were killed when this happened, twenty years ago. I wonder if they


were sleeping in these rooms at the time, or if this was part of


the working area of the ship, not living quarters. And what


about the others?my mind whispers. The forty-some people


who started out on this ship and aren’t among the living now? What


Dylan glides past the damage, coming back to


the landing strip, and now I can see it, a patch of cleared land


where the clay is packed down in a long, narrow run. “There,” I


tell him, and he nods, eases the craft down. It shakes around us,


reluctant, and for a moment I think we’re not going to be able to


hold the position, the skids slip in the clay and we’re going to


Chapter 39