Star Rigger's Way

His rigger crewmates suddenly and horribly dead, Gev Carlyle is adrift in the Flux, the subjective sea that carries starships at faster-than-light speeds. His lone companion, and his only hope for survival, is a cantankerous castaway alien.
Only a compatible rigger team, their visions meshed in psychic unity, can safely harness the most turbulent currents of the Flux--and Carlyle's ship is being drawn inexorably toward a deadly maelstrom, the unthinkable stresses of the Hurricane Flume. For even a scant chance at survival, he needs the catlike alien's help. But the price for that help is a complete merging of minds and memories.
And Carlyle, at war with his own past, dreads that union more than death itself.
The novel that introduced the Star Rigger universe to thousands of readers.