The back of the cryopod shifted out of the way. Cold fog rippled through the storage bay, floating, with no gravity to hold it down. Canisters of grey metal with blue tops were in a vault behind the cryopods, built into the wall. Shallow and small enough to be easily hidden. Hart found her catch, and the pod opened. All five must have them. A few canisters behind each pod.

Hart and Naomi exchanged looks. Hart went to the backup supplies and came back with two pairs of gloves to protect against the cold. Naomi reached forward, untwisting the cap, but they both knew what they would find.

More nitrogen smoke floated from the open canister. Hart shifted to her left, reached in with medical tongs. Drew out small vials, filled with pale, frozen liquid.

Naomi’s breathing grew shallow.

Embryos. Hundreds, thousands of embryos hidden behind the cryopods that had stored the backup crew. Already fertilised. Another seed vault that neither of them had known about. Naomi would put good money down that Hixon and Lebedeva didn’t, either.

Naomi screwed the top back on, slid the canister back. They watched as the false bottom of the cryopod slid back into place. The nitro fog slowly cleared, drifting into the filters in the walls.

Hart and Naomi stared at each other.

Naomi forced herself to say the words.

“I think we found Valerie’s plan B.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

5 Years Before Launch

Houston, Texas

They would never let Naomi go into space.

Training had gone well, and she had technically graduated to the astronaut corps. But it didn’t matter.

NASA never said so outright, and those within the organisation wanted to send women up there. To treat everyone with equality, build on the strides they’d made over the last few decades. The system was already working against them. Bigotry had a way of sliding through the cracks.

It didn’t matter how hard Naomi worked. How well she placed on various tests and examinations. Her job description would always come with a desk. She was so far down on the waiting list for a mission to the moon, the ISS, or the under-construction Gateway that she might as well not be on it at all. She’d been five to ten years too late.

Naomi felt like she’d disappointed the little girl she’d once been. The quiet, nervous child who still faced her fears and went to science camp every summer and wore NASA emblazoned everything. She’d promised that girl she would go up in a rocket. Every day, she was surrounded by people who urged her patience, who assured her she still had a chance. Well qualified, hardworking men who were blissfully unaware at how so many others around them didn’t have that shot, no matter how much they proclaimed otherwise. It was Mercury 7 and 13 all over again.