Margot McCallan expected to sleep peacefully through the months’ long journey to a new life on a distant colony planet. But she’s rudely awakened and rescued from a hypersleep chamber full of fellow colonists who have turned into ghouls with an insane hunger for flesh.
Chief of Operations Izzy Ramirez expected the usual uneventful trip ferrying sleeping colonists and their supplies. But when a saboteur repeatedly triggers a virus that cripples the ship’s computer and wakes colonists randomly, she has to lead the rescue parties to save those lucky few who don’t wake up hungry.
Margot and Izzy should never have met, despite sharing that journey. But now they’re a team, working to end the nightmare and save the lives of thousands of people. As their feelings for each other grow stronger, they try to wait, to put romance on hold until they are no longer facing danger together. But it’s hard not to reach out for hope in the midst of horror.
She headed to the rec room, in search of the warm milk. The room only had a dim light on, and when Margot went in she left it dark like that. The dim light was over the table with snacks and drinks. She poured some hot milk and added sugar and a little vanilla flavoring and curled up in one of the armchairs. She’d only been there a few minutes when Izzy came in, heading for the food table, without spotting Margot in the shadows.
“Hello,” Margot said, keeping her voice quiet, the darkness evoking the feeling of a sacred space. Izzy started and looked around at her.
“Oh. Didn’t see you there.” She got herself a cup of hot chocolate and came over to the armchair beside Margot’s. “Can I join you?”
“Of course. Can’t sleep?”
Izzy sighed, settling in. “Never can after ... well, after.” She sipped her hot chocolate.
“I was just in the infirmary,” Margot said. “The boy you rescued is doing well, Jules said.”
“That’s good. You okay?”
“Me? I’m fine. It’s not like I did anything.” The harsh tone of her voice surprised her. Izzy gave her a look, then reached out and patted her hand where it lay on the arm of the chair. The tingle her touch set off in Margot took her by surprise and made her catch her breath.
“Thanks for helping me clear up after,” Izzy said. “And for covering the duty shift in Ops.”
“I can do more than that next time.”
“I can have Dom train you to help run the scramble from the board.”
“Why isn’t Dom on a rescue team?”
“Dom? The captain deemed his skills too valuable. He’s our chief navigator -- and the only other navigation specialist was in a rescue that ... um went badly.”
“Then I volunteer.” Her head throbbed, which was probably lack of sleep, but also like a head of steam building up. Like a boiler about to burst. “I don’t have special skills. I mean, not for getting us to the colony, or surviving the trip there anyway. I want to be on the rescue squad.”
Izzy looked at her for a long time, assessing. She had left her hand over Margot’s. As if recalling herself she suddenly moved it away, leaving the skin feeling cold.
“I think you do have some special skills,” she said. “Johaan told me about the assignment he gave you.”
Margot waved the bereft hand. “I can draw up a plan and instructions for my suggestions of what you can do if you find certain compounds, how to deploy them, just in case. Once I’ve done that I don’t have to be there to use them.” She calmed herself and smiled wanly. “Obviously I’d prefer to be.”
Izzy smiled back. “I’d prefer that too.”
And there was that tingle again, but this time deep inside, not just on her skin. Margot’s smile wanted to widen, but she restrained herself and put on a determined look instead. Stern. Ready for serious work. Izzy looked torn for a moment, but then sighed and rubbed her forehead.
“Okay, Mac, you asked for it and I don’t have the luxury of turning anyone down. We need as many people as possible, and I can’t put that boy in the sickbay on it.”
Margot stood. She could sleep now, she thought. “I’ll see you in the morning then.”
“It is morning.”
“See you later in the morning then.”
Izzy laughed. “Whatever you say. We’ll see which weapons you’re best with.”
That gave Margot a wobble as she left the rec room. Weapons? Her? Margot McCallan, high school teacher?
But she thought about Izzy calling her Mac. That was a military thing, wasn’t it, giving people nicknames like that? Izzy already saw her as a comrade. The thought made Margot warm from head to toe.
