Free Syn-En: Plague World: The Founders War Begins by Linda Andrews

clear some of this soup.”
    Air whooshed through the conduits. Fog still clung to the front portholes.
    Bei expected as much. He reconnected the power lines. “Set her down, Brooklyn.”
    “Aye, Admiral, setting her down.” The Starflight settled into stillness.
    Queens slowed the feed of solid fuel. “Ground seems to be holding the Starflight’s weight. Powering down stabilizers.”
    Quiet mushroomed in the cockpit.
    “Nicely done, you two.” Bei waited a minute. Then two. Nothing. Damn, the systems didn’t reboot on their own. He turned off his magnetic field. “I want full diagnostics of the engine.”
    Brooklyn unsnapped his safety harness and leapt out of his seat. “Aye, Admiral. A full diagnostic coming right up.”
    Queens followed hard on the other man’s heels. “Dammit, dorkwad, we’re medics.”
    Raising his index finger, Brooklyn interrupted his friend and took the stairs down to the landing two at a time. “Ah, but we were damn fine mechanics first.”
    “True. True.” Queens leapt to the opening near the ladder leading to the engine room below. “We’re Scotty and Bones rolled into one.”
    Brooklyn hooked his hands and feet around the ladder rails and slid out of sight. “Speak for yourself. I’m Scotty, Bones and Spock in one sweet cyborg package.”
    “Kirk would have booted you too hams off the Enterprise before your first away mission.” Nell’s voice cracked. “He wouldn’t have wanted the competition.”
    Bei raised his head and jogged down the stairs.
    “You look a little pale, Nell Stafford.” Brooklyn cleared his throat.
    “Aside from revisiting those Sweetarts I enjoyed in the Third grade, I’m fine.” She forced a laugh. “I’ve had rougher rides at Disneyland.”
    Pulling his arms close to his body, Bei ignored the ladder and jumped through the opening. He landed with a thud. The deck bowed beneath his weight. Emergency lights illuminated the aisles.
    Brooklyn and Queens spun about. Their muscles clenched in preparation of an assault.
    Queens lowered his hands first. “I don’t understand. Isn’t Disneyland an amusement park? Why would people think nearly smashing into a planet was fun?”
    Brooklyn rolled his brown eyes and shoved his friend toward the door to the engine room. “You are such a dorkwad.”
    Bei strode down the aisle toward his wife. “Nell?”
    “I’m okay.” She clung to an open overhead bin, steadying herself. “Shaken, not stirred, like a James Bond martini, but still fine.”
    Paladin Apollie shone a flashlight into Doc’s face. “He isn’t healing.”
    A gash on Doc’s forehead peeled his NDA from his titanium plated skull. Skin curled back over his black hair. “I’ll be fine. Just let me up. I need to check to see if we’ve maintained integrity.”
    Integrity. Bei stiffened. His chief medical officer obviously feared the Surlat strain had breeched the hull. “Let him up, Nell.”
    She wrinkled her nose. “I’m just gonna fix him. Can’t have him looking like the Terminator when he checks on Karl and Erin. They might get a little freaked.” His wife ran her finger along his cut.
    The Doc’s NDA began to zip up, sealing the gash.
    She smiled. “There. Easy peasy. Now, you can...”
    Her finger started to glow. Fluorescence spread to her hand and up her arm. She shook her limb, trying to dislodge it. A heartbeat later, a sickly yellow color bathed the bay. Her eyes met Bei’s.
    He tasted her fear.
    “Well, this just sucks.”
    Apollie retreated to the far corner of her bench and covered her mouth. “Nell Stafford is infected. We’re all infected.”

 
     
     
Chapter 7
     
     
    “Okay, nobody panic.” Nell held up both of her arms, palms facing out, in the universally acknowledged stop gesture. The glow under her skin meant only one thing. She was infected. She might even die. Her stomach cramped. “And by nobody, I mean me.”
    Her throat felt raw. Heat licked her nerve endings. Did screaming count as