While the Rat's Away

By Kate Macleod

In a future where interstellar travel is only possible for humans by stowing away like rats in the walls of alien ships, few choose to travel far from home.

Indeed, Sister June never strayed beyond the boundaries of the dome on Mars that housed her commune. And she never intended to wake on the journey from that dome to another on the far side of the universe.

But a pair of stowaways drain too many resources from the other travelers, forcing all of them as well as the man entrusted to transport them to their destination to spend the journey meant for cold sleep awake and in each other’s company.

The stowaways are like no one Sister June has ever met before. Brash and assertive, they show no fear at making their opinions and desires known.

But as strange as they are, they just might be more worthy of trust than the man hired to keep her and her people safe.

“While the Rat’s Away,” a science fiction short story which originally appeared in the pages of Analog Science Fiction & Fact Magazine.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Ratatoskr Press
• Release date: Jan 3, 2024
• ISBN: 9781958606827

Kate Macleod

Dr. Kate MacLeod is an innovative inclusive educator, researcher, and author. She began her career as a high school special education teacher in New York City and now works as faculty in the college of education at the University of Maine Farmington and as an education consultant with Inclusive Schooling. She has spent 15 years studying inclusive practices and supporting school leaders and educators to feel prepared and inspired to include all learners.

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While the Rat's Away

WHILE THE RAT'S AWAY

KATE MACLEOD

Ratatoskr Press

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CONTENTS

While the Rat's Away

Sci-Fi Serial Podcast!

Complete Series: The Travels of Scout Shannon

New Series: The Ritchie and Fitz Sci-Fi Murder Mysteries

Also from Kate MacLeod

Also from Ratatoskr Press

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About the Author

Also by Kate Macleod

WHILE THE RAT'S AWAY

The last thing I remembered before the drugs took me was the smell of the antiseptic that had been sprayed inside the cold sleep mask before it had been placed over my face. It had been distinctly unpleasant, like a metallic kind of minty smell that was far too strong. It made me more than a little suspicious. It was too much like the other places I had passed through since leaving the commune on Mars. In the commune, we had scrubbed diligently and daily. I knew what clean smelled like.

This? Was the overpowering aroma that resulted from someone not wanting you to know just how unclean they were letting things stay. Because spraying a smell was so much easier than scrubbing and sterilizing.

I had only gotten a single whiff of it before the cold sleep had washed over me, though. Not even time to form all those thoughts. No, those thoughts percolated up in my mind as I floated in some liminal space between sleep and wakefulness. In that place, I had nothing to do but smell that smell, and gag on it, and finally to realize with that mask still fitted over my nose and mouth, I really had better not throw up.

Then all at once it was gone, and I sucked in a deep lungful of nonminty air.

Easy, said a voice I recognized at once as Brother August.

That was terrible, I said, and heard my voice rasping hoarsely. I wiped my mouth, where drool had dried in sticky, crusty patches, and then at something all too similar that had formed on my eyelids.

Then I took a look around. This is the place? I tried not to sound as disappointed as I felt. I knew the new commune was