“I’m not a hero, I’m just somebody who knows what they’re doing.”
This is how Paramedic Matthew Caldey introduces himself to the hero-worshipping trainees he doesn’t really know how to train, the fledgling team he has no idea how to lead. He knows how to save lives, how to stay alive in the unforgiving loneliness of deep space. That is all. On Earth, politicians are ushering in a new era for the colony worlds that include Matt’s patch, and the resistance to change is deadly. A brutal terrorist cell is bombing space stations, ships and floating colonies indiscriminately, having already claimed the lives of five of Matt’s colleagues. The body count is rising, but the paramedics of Ninth Deep Space Rescue Company keep picking up the pieces, each day venturing out into the devastation. Some days not all of them come home.
With fresh-faced rookies to break in, and the threat of a bombing on their home space station, McKinley, growing ever greater, Matt is under pressure from EMS directors to keep response times down, and recovery rates up. If he can rebuild the Company in six months, he will receive his Captain bars, and his team will get a significant pay rise and well earned leave. If he can’t, they will all face losing their jobs. Starting an on/off relationship with a lively, but troubled rookie called Amy Armitage, Matt hopes the next six months won’t be the most complicated of his life. Then, come the visions: a beautiful young girl that only he can see and hear, appearing whenever a patient dies, whispering in his ear, taunting him.
Is Matt Caldey losing his mind? How many more friends must he lead to their deaths? Will he be able to rebuild the Company? Who is the mysterious girl? Hallucination? Ghost? Or something more sinister? And what is the meaning of her repeated warning: “Blood on the hands of heroes-that-were and captains-to-be; witness the rise of the vermillion dawn…”
