John Moralee: Future Imperfect: A Collection of Science Fiction Stories

One night my sleep was disturbed by a thunderous boom. It rattled every window in my bedroom and sent my heart racing. I sat up, momentarily confused, my dreams swirling with reality in my head. For a second, I thought my mother was still there, taking me as a little girl for a long and sunny walk in the woods beyond our village. But then I remembered she had gone, and cold, hard reality slammed down. That joyous summer walk had happened twenty years ago. I no longer lived in a village—but in Dorado, the capital city of Arcadia, where I rented a studio apartment with my sister.

In the darkness, my bed was shaking like a minor tremor had struck the building. A framed picture and some books toppled off a shelf. I sat up, pulling off my sheets as my bed stopped rocking and everything settled into silence. What had caused that boom? My room was too dark to see anything. I called out to my sister. Shada had moved in with me on her eighteenth birthday. She worked as a model and shared the rent, making it possible for us to live in a decent sixtieth-floor apartment with a great view over the city.

“Did you hear that?”

Stupid question. Of course Shada had heard it, but she did not answer. I mumbled a command to switch on my bedside lamp, illuminating my side of the room in a rosy light. I frowned. Shada’s bed was empty. In the confusion of being rudely awoken, I’d completely forgotten she had gone out partying without me, because I’d wanted to study the crime reports for my sector.

The noise had abated—but the room was still shaking slightly. Something big had made that boom and I guessed I knew what it was—but I needed to confirm it. I stumbled to the curtains and looked out into the night.

Though the twin moons were out in full, shining a pale greenish light over the glittering city, they were not the brightest objects visible in the pre-dawn sky.

An alien ship marked the starry sky like a white comet, leaving a fiery tail in its wake as it entered our atmosphere directly over Dorado. The ship was both beautiful and frightening. It should have entered the atmosphere over the ocean, where the shock wave would not have disturbed anyone, but too many pilots didn’t bother with our planetary regulations. They flew how they liked, because we needed them more than they needed us. I swore. Some off-worlders thought they could land on our planet at their convenience, treating Arcadia like a parking lot. My hands tightened into fists. Such arrogance.

I watched the ship until it disappeared over the horizon in the direction of the spaceport.

I returned to bed and tried to sleep, but I could not relax. I had to get up for work in a few hours anyway, so I showered and ate breakfast while watching my favourite newsfeeds. The ship’s arrival was mentioned endless times. The ship was a Nexian Starcruiser filled with 15,000 passengers and a cargo of exotic off-world goods. The passengers included diplomats, wealthy travellers, socialites and ordinary citizens of the New Commonwealth. Of special interest to the gossip channels, the celebrity fashion designer Maxx Impact was aboard with his entourage of thirty clones of himself. Maxx Impact’s show, sponsored by Sunstone Corporation, was the top-trending story on most feeds, but I didn’t care about Maxx Impact or his upcoming fashion show in the newly-opened Halcyon Plaza. I’d never been much of a fashion follower like my sister, whose wardrobe contained a load of designer dresses, shoes and jewellery. She loved shopping for new clothes. Me, I didn’t care. Sweats were my off-duty outfits—when I wasn’t wearing one of my three smart-material uniforms for work.

That morning I was putting on my combat boots when I received an email from Rasha’s Emporium in the Scrawl.

YOUR ORDER IS READY FOR COLLECTION.

“Huh?” It was an unexpected message. I had not ordered anything recently. It was probably a junk email, but it had not been flagged as spam. I opened the message on the wall-screen opposite the kitchen table.

Dear Customer,

Your order—Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland (Lewis Carroll), First Edition (Earth original)—will be available for collection from today.

Thank you for using Rasha’s Emporium, The Scrawl’s premier seller of antiques and esoterica, voted Arcadia’s 3012 #1 Retailer of the Year.

That was weird. I definitely had not ordered Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland . It was one of my childhood favourite reads—a book my mother had read to me over and over—but I could never afford an original physical copy. Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland was over a thousand years old. First editions belonged in museums and private collections.

It had to be a mistake.

I called the shop and spoke to a human assistant. “My name’s Chara Hudson. I’ve just received a message about a book called Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland .”

“Yes,” the assistant said. “I’m pleased to say your book is here.”

“Um. The thing is, I’m a little confused because I didn’t order it. Is it a computer error?”

“No. The order is correct. It’s listed as a gift from another customer.”

“Another customer?” I was stunned. “Who sent it?”

“That information isn’t in the system. Just the sender’s shipping ID.”

“What’s that?”

“NX-567-22RF-Q290-3024A.”

“Where’s the origin?”

“Nexus Prime. The customer must have sent it from there—but they didn’t leave a name or return address. I’m sorry. Is there a problem?”

Yes. I didn’t know anyone living on Nexus Prime. The planet was two system jumps away. “What else can you tell me?”

“Uh. We received the book this morning in pristine condition from the spaceport. It’s stored in a sealed stasis box, kept as fresh as the day it was packed. The package will only open to your voice and a DNA signature. We can send it to you, but for an item so valuable the extra insurance and delivery cost will be expensive. You can pick it up for free if you come to our store. What do you want us to do?”

“Uh. I guess I’ll collect it when I can. Thanks for helping.”

There was only one person who knew how much Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland meant to me. My mother—Eryn Hudson. But why would my mother send me a present after so long? She had sent nothing for my last twenty birthdays—so why now?

The last time I had seen her had been when I was eight.

Because my mother had acted like she loved me so much, I’d believed that made her a good person, incapable of having a dark side. But I had only ever seen a small part of her life—when she was at home, spending time with her family. That person had been a caring, loving, inspiring woman, a woman I had admired and wanted to be like when I was older. At work for Sunstone Corporation, Eryn Hudson had been someone else: a powerful executive in charge of a large department, running an ambitious construction project to build a space elevator that would tether to a geostationary space station. The project—when completed— would have reduced ecological damage and improved economic prospects for the whole planet. Would have— but didn’t. Sixteen months into the project, when the space elevator consisted of a sky-tall stalk of twisted cables, the cables snapped at the base and the elevator collapsed, killing nineteen employees.

An investigation uncovered a fault in the fabrication process caused by a deliberate design error. The sabotage was traced to my mother’s department. Someone had sent a faulty design from a computer in her office, using a code only known by a handful of employees. The police investigation had no proof against anyone—until they discovered my mother had been having a two-year affair with Garth Zin, an executive at a rival company, whose spaceport investments would suffer a huge loss if the space elevator was completed. Zin had moved a substantial amount of money into a new company shortly before the sabotage. Eryn Hudson was listed as co-CEO of that company. With proof of their connection, the police issued two arrest warrants. They raided Zin’s home first—but he had not been there. He had already taken a spaceflight three days earlier, leaving the system straight after the disaster. The police had only my mother left to charge—so they surrounded our house with drones and burst in while everyone was sleeping. I would never forget being woken by police shouting and pointing guns. They had been too late. My mother fled the planet just like her lover Zin, becoming one of the planet’s most notorious wanted criminals.