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

“This is obviously airborne,” Shanley


says, “and it infects the lungs first with almost flu-like


symptoms, so it’s definitely a respiratory disease. The thing is,


it kills like the bleed, so I can only assume this is a mutated


strain. Since we haven’t gotten it—” he motions with one hand,


including Parker, Dylan, and me in that statement— “I’m thinking it


might just attack someone with antibodies to the original strain.


So any of the colonists are susceptible to it.”


Ellington pinches the bridge of his nose, as


he tends to do when things are getting out of control, and he


tells him. Beside me, Dylan sighs. I know, baby,I


think—researching the virus means staying here longer and neither


of us wants that. “I’ve started them on a combination of adenosine


and rifavir, which I’m hoping will inhibit the virus before it gets


to the bleed out stage. I think we should put everyone else on the


Chapter 119