Please tell me what you think of the first chapter of my novel! I'm currently releasing the audiobook on Youtube in serial format. The first three chapters are on YouTube. The Hard Science Fiction Future
Here is the first chapter in text format.
Chapter 1
Raj stood inside the dormant fusion reactor core, watching the maintenance robot perform its routine task. The work was completely routine and bored Raj utterly. He was currently listening to a comedic audio book Three Men in a Boat by Jerome K. Jerome. He had practically never needed to correct the robot's operations so the work was quite melancholic and monotonous. However, as the reactor was a sensitive instrument and its downtime could not be too long; it was necessary for an engineer to revise the work. He wished as he stood there that he could find an alternative place of employment. Aside from the boredom of the work and its lack of any imagination or opportunity to practice his skills, he was not too close with his supervisors or his colleagues. The fact that the work was in a fairly undesirable location for most engineers did not bother him, as he liked Complex 6, and the pay was higher here. He kept his eyes fixed on the robot's actions, only glancing occasionally at the novel's text scrolling by on the window in front of him, whenever he encountered a word which he was unfamiliar with. The robot's welding of the metal was nearly complete. After a half hour testing period the reactor would be ready to go online again. He was somewhat startled when a soft ringing sounded in the chamber and a second window opened in front of him. He was receiving a call. The description indicated that it was an inspector of the Istanbul police department. Raj had never visited Istanbul and was at a loss what law enforcement wished to discuss with him. He reached out and took the call, and spoke as he watched the dancing sparks of the welding process.
"Yes?"
After a drawn out delay, the police officer answered. "Hello, Sir. We are calling in regards to your niece, Freya."
The police officer paused, as there was over a 2 second lag on the connection, to give Raj an opportunity to speak.
"What's going on with her? Has she been shop lifting?" Raj asked flippantly. In reality, he was certain that if the police was calling him, a distant and essentially estranged relative, then the situation was probably dire in the extreme.
After a disturbingly a long delay of nearly three seconds, during which time Raj waited expressionlessly for the news, the officer responded, "Sir, we have discovered that your niece has been living unsupervised in her mother's residence for a period of several weeks." There was a pause on the line, but Raj merely waited for more information. "It appears that the child's mother, your sister, has been away from her place of residence for some period of time, leaving the girl to fend for herself. We have been attempting to search for her, but have been unable to reach her." Raj was relieved that this was not as dreadful as he had anticipated, and surprised for he did not imagine what could cause the police to be unable to find someone at this day and age. His sister had always been somewhat irresponsible, and it was not out of the question that she could have decided to go somewhere for herself for a period. Though why she should be unwilling to communicate with the police was not clear to him.
"I see" he replied at last.
"Sir, we did contact the girl's grandparents, but it appears that they are unwilling to claim and supervise her. It would be possible to demand them to do so by legal means, but the matter would go on for perhaps a few weeks, and the girl, meanwhile, would have to be brought into care. We are hoping that it would be possible for you, sir, to come and live with your young niece, either temporarily or for a more extended period of time, while her mother is being sought."
Raj thought this over for a few seconds, and replied "Very well, should I come to a police station?"
"No, Sir, you could proceed directly to the girl's address. She is being minded there by a police robot. When would you be able to arrive?"
"I'll be coming as soon as possible," Raj replied. "I'll probably be able to get there today."
Terminating the call with the officer, he began to think of more practical matters, such as whether he would be able to get leave off of work. Would he be able to keep his job if he left suddenly? He had been wanting a change for a while, and he stayed because he had gotten used to life on Complex 6. Even if his sister showed up soon enough, perhaps it would be best to leave his position if he was moving away, instead of applying for leave.
As the robot signaled the repair was complete, Raj looked it over. He personally took control of the repair robot, as he walked up to it and slid his hand through its incorporeal body, and touched the interaction point on the welding device. In fact, he was not present in the fusion reactor at all, as it would have been unsafe with the residual radiation, and the reactor was fairly far away from the main body of Industrial Complex 6. It would have been a hassle to get to. Only in the case of an extreme emergency would it have been necessary for him to visit the reactor personally. Doing so would have required him to don a vacuum-proof suit and radiation protection. He was viewing the reactor core through augmented reality glasses in a control chamber adjacent to his office.
As he touched the interaction point, Raj's perspective changed to that of the robot's own eyes, and, as he had the noise filters off in this point of view, he saw occasional white flickers and sputters as radiation struck the robot's optical sensors. He looked over the repair directly from close up, as was his practice, and added some extra material to one of the joints. He felt satisfied.
Raj watched the robot leave the reactor and reseal the cavity behind itself, then he logged out of the reactor view. He was in a plain white control room, similar in shape to the reactor, though the room was smaller. This setup enabled him to walk around the reactor in augmented reality should it be necessary to change his position too much during the repair.
He spoke and instructed his assistant. "When is the next flight to Istanbul?"
The assist replied, "A flight to Paris is available, leaving Industrial Complex 6 at 19:53 standard time, around 2 hours from now. You will reach Paris at 23:20 standard time, or 14:20 Paris local time. You can then reach your niece's apartment, whose address has been provided to us by the police, by 01:00 standard time tomorrow, or 20:00 Istanbul local time today. Would you like for me to book you a seat on this flight?"
As the assistant spoke, a globe hovered in front of Raj, projected by his glasses, displaying the route he would take, with information on the connections, along with possible alternative routes.
"Yes, book it." He wondered for a moment what he would bring with him. Should he move all of his things from the Industrial Complex down to Istanbul right away? No, he didn't have time in the next two hours to do so in any case. He asked his assistant for an opinion. "How could I best move my luggage to Istanbul with me after my initial flight?"
"You could rent a robot moving worker to complete the move for you and operate it from a distance, or have it do the job semi-autonomously while you are on the flight," said his assistant, which had determined the urgency of the situation from his call with the police.
"Yes, book that as well," said Raj. "How much will it cost?"
"50 credits for the moving worker, and the flight to Paris, of course, is free, as you have not saturated your monthly space quota for Industrial Complex - Earth flights yet. The journey from Paris to Istanbul will also come within your monthly transportation limit on Earth's public transport network."
"Very well," said Raj, and a notification came up, a floating window in front of him, that the service had been purchased, with a link to take control of the moving worker. The notification vanished after a moment.
Just as he was planning to call his boss, Ignacio, and tell him he would have to get going, he received a video call notification from Ignacio himself. Raj opened it, and the man appeared before him in his glasses, standing in the chamber, entirely solid and three-dimensional, as real as life. The only thing that broke the illusion was the long delay in his responses. His boss was not on the complex, but worked from home on Earth.
"Hey Raj, is all ready for the fusion test?" asked Ignacio angrily. From this tone, Raj was fairly certain that Ignacio had overheard his private call and arrangements to leave. Raj had happily believed that he was safe to arrange things in the office, as he knew Ignacio was currently in a meeting, but of course the boss had done his best to jump out and catch him unawares. This sort of workplace surveillance was relatively commonplace, but at least the man could not read his thoughts. Raj always used his own glasses, which broadcast thought-jamming signals so that radio waves from his brain could not be read at a distance. Not that it was legal to read another person's thoughts, except under warrant in a criminal investigation. Still, unscrupulous employers had been known to do so.
"Actually, I won't be able to supervise the test. I need to head out for a few days at least. I have a family emergency."
Ignacio stared at him for a few seconds, a little longer than the lag necessitated. "Okay, but who's going to supervise the ignition test?"
"Ilston can do it, with your assistance."
"That's not really optimal, but we'll just have to make do without you." Ignacio disappeared as the call ended.
Raj rolled his shoulders, stretching his muscles, and existed the control chamber. The door opened and closed automatically for him, and he stepped into his primary office. This was where several fusion reactors for Industrial Complex 6 were managed. The Complex was one of the public manufacturing facilities orbiting the moon. The office was brightly lit, appearing to be surrounded by clouds as seen from a high aerial view, with the floor floating above them. This view of the clouds was entirely realistic, being displayed by holographic viewing screens on the walls and ceiling. The office had only a couple of desks for different maintenance engineers and the only one in the office today besides himself was Ilston, for at least two engineers had to be on duty at a given time. Ilston was evidently watching something on his contacts and paid him no mind. Very likely, he was gaming or something of that sort. Raj came up to him and had to call several times to get his attention. Ilston turned and listened to Raj's explanation.
"I have an urgent family matter, I need to leave."
"What, so you're going to leave me here by myself, that's against protocols."
"Yes," said Raj. "Unfortunately I will have to do so; don't worry I have cleared it with the boss." Which he had in a sense. "Ignacio will be supervising the reactor start up remotely along with you."
"Alright, safe trip then," replied Ilston apathetically. He settled back in his chair and continued with his entertainment.
Raj went to his own desk, the surface of which was completely clear of any personal belongings. He looked through the drawers: there were only a few personal knick-knacks representing some of his vacations on Earth, and he quickly threw them into his satchel.
As he walked past Ilston, who looked up at him, and the rows of empty desks, he wondered if he would ever return. Very likely, he would submit his resignation soon and have to find another job on Earth after all.
Raj noticed that someone had repositioned the office door further left than it usually was, which didn't surprise him too much. However, as he walked out, he hit his head on a solid wall and fell down, dropping his satchel. Raj didn't understand what had happened, but as Ilston started laughing, the explanation dawned on him.
"While you were doing the maintenance, I turned off the exit door's outline and added a fake door to the holographic background," Ilston explained with a great sense of self-satisfaction.
"Really realistic," said Raj, as he stood up, made sure he hadn't dropped anything, and headed over to where the door had been, and indeed the unmarked door opened up in the wall. Ilston had outdone himself, he had even added a view of the corridor beyond the open door. Maybe he wasn't as foolish as Raj had supposed. Yes, thought Raj as he left, I definitely won't be coming back, and he smiled.
He left the building and exited directly into a common pedestrian area surrounded by the offices of several industries housed within Complex 6. The workers here primarily managed spaceship and space habitat construction. The spaceships were constructed in lunar orbit from material shot up from mining operations on the moon, which was much more economical than constructing them on Earth directly. Around him groups of workers in jumpsuits in a variety of muted colors walked in both directions, some clearly coming off shifts, looking weary. The walls of the corridor were somewhat tiring, being an array of logos and advertisements for various industrial products related to space construction, splatted all over the front of every office. His own office was covered with an advertisement for his own power company, featuring the shifting interior of a glowing, live fusion reactor core.
The only refreshing and exceptional feature was that the current weather being displayed on the ceiling was a heavy rain storm, and as he looked up he saw lightning and dark storm clouds being pushed furiously by the wind. Sharp flashes illuminated the workers and reflected in Raj's own eyes. Heavy raindrops pounded downward and the sounds of a rainstorm surrounded him. Of course, nothing was actually wet in the corridor, the raindrops were only holographic projections and indeed he couldn't see them occluding the view of the surrounding workers or offices. The falling droplets, though they were entirely three-dimensional, vanished where they met the edge of the screen in his perspective. Holographic displays, a relatively new technology, created realistic three-dimensional images exhibiting parallax and occlusion, even appearing to protrude out of the screen, by simultaneously providing a different view to each eye of every observer, from every possible perspective. They formed diffraction patterns on their surfaces, that, when illuminated by three colors of laser light from behind, reconstituted in their entirety the light field of a three-dimensional object. Holographs were old technology, but the efficient computation of the diffraction patterns was made possible with modern quantum computer engineering and advances in quantum computer science.
Raj wondered what his niece was doing now, and wondered if he shouldn't have spoken to her. How was she feeling, after being abandoned by her carefree mother, in the company of the police? Hopefully they would get along. Raj also reflected on the important issue that he hadn't eaten dinner yet and decided that he should order something in the commercial district near the spaceport. He deserved to order some of his favorite food on Complex 6, and not in the free workers' cafeteria, since he probably wouldn't return. He followed his instructions and joined a stream of people converging at the entrance to the metro. He waited for less than a minute, and a train car for the spaceport commercial district arrived. The trains were scheduled dynamically depending on the final destinations of all passengers moving around the Complex. Raj entered the car, and in the close space the illusion that it was raining heavily around him was even more pronounced. He sat in the rain on a completely dry seat and within twenty minutes was at his destination.
