Preview: Nexus, Part 3

We're moving right along through Chapter 1! Here's our third installment.

Same as always, this is only a preview. Some of the writing may change after its final visit with the editor.

Expect the full novel around August. Hopefully a bit earlier.

Previously:
Chapter 1, Part 1

Chapter 1, Part 2

Happy reading!

Nexus: Chapter 1, Part 3
We'd been out of the worm-gate a few weeks. The corridors still had that plasticky new ship smell. I killed lots of time walking the halls, because we were weeks away from having anything to do.
I got an incoming message on my HUD, from SecDiv. Her image, name and rank popped up on my eyescreen, Lieutenant Louise Templeton. It was strange seeing her at that rank. She'd been a sergeant when I was worked with her in SecDiv, what felt like several lifetimes ago. We’d been in love, as madly as two people ever were. It ended… incompletely. I hadn't seen her in years before the voyage. She didn't know I was up for a spot on the Nexus, and I hadn't known about her. It was a coincidence she ended up my head of SecDiv- unless it was somebody in the company’s idea of a sick joke.
I pulled her into the corner of my eyescreen. Her dark hair was pulled back in a bun in a way that made her seem more severe than she was- though she could be severe.
She was first on my personality compatibility matrix, and seventh for genetic compatibility; since it was a generational ship, they built those matrices during crew selection to make sure we wouldn’t get out past Jupiter before everybody realized they had no intention of boning anybody else. I hadn't had the computer build a composite, but I suspected we would have beautiful, disturbingly brilliant children- though I wasn’t sure if either of us wanted that.
“LT? What's happening?” I realized only after answering that I'd called her by her initials, LT like 'melty,' like I used to, and hoped she could confuse it with a recitation of her rank- we were still a ways away from being back to friendly.
“I've got a situation developing. An ensign's setting off the decibel sensors in the corridor, trying to blow the drums out of one of my SecOff's ears. I'm on the bridge, or I'd handle it myself.”
“And SecDiv's gone a whole week without bloodying a crew member.”
“That, too,” she said with a smile. “Just down the hall from your twenty- location.” I wasn’t far enough out of the security services I’d forgotten my ten codes, but it had probably been a while since she’d worked security for someone with my background.


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