Micro-Humanity. Lippi Daniele

world’s nations got strained, a victim of panic and selfishness.

      When the fifth year of research was hit and an enormous amount of money had been spent, not only results could not be seen yet, but the scientists themselves began to give up and, one after the other, abandoned the project because of stress and pressure.

      It was in that year, in perhaps the darkest moment, when everything seemed doomed to fail, that an unknown scientist — employed by a multinational transport company — sent his idea and project together with a simple sentence: “We need more space, but Earth is the only place we can dispose of and, if we take up too much space then, why don’t we just try to take up less space?”

      The unknown scientist was summoned to explain his idea. He showed up before the brightest minds in the world with a simple yet effective molecular modulator, on which he had been working for years in order to reduce packages, containers and their contents so that it was possible to transport more of them in one go.

      The modulator he presented was already half-working, in the sense that it acted on matter, reducing the space among atoms, neutrons, neutrinos, and so on, thus making things smaller, but unfortunately he hadn’t managed to reverse the process yet.

      The scientists observed with interest but without too much enthusiasm for a not-so-original idea until Pikelell — that was the man’s name — pointed his modulator on a sheep shrinking it to be not bigger than a bean in less than a second.

      Everyone watched the little animal looking around and panicking, starting to run wildly in all directions and a triumphant Pikelell exclaimed “We do not need more space if we can make the space we have become a thousand times bigger for us!”

      Scientists started thinking and it all made sense. The population of Rome could be entirely contained in the Colosseum. Megacities such as New York, Tokyo, London, Paris, Mexico City, Rio de Janeiro, and others could house their population in one of their skyscrapers over 500 meters high. Each floor — less than two men tall — was going to be as tall as 350, if not more. A single cow was about to satisfy thousands of people, agricultural areas that today fed tens of thousands were going to feed millions but, more importantly, a liter of water — that was now not enough for a single person — was going to quench hundreds of people.

      There was the problem of the irreversibility of the process but everyone, scientists at the head, decided that it was currently of secondary importance. In less than a few weeks everyone — scientists, governments, and nations — agreed. It had to be done.

      In the following years everything was aimed at the transition. Everything, that was going to be needed by humanity once shrunk, was mass produced. Priority was given to technology. Building microscopic computers and processors was nothing new, but designing screens of the necessary size, for example, was a novelty. The world 3D printers began to churn out all sorts of goods such as furniture, supplies, and so on. The buildings, that were going to contain the new humanity, were identified and adapted to contain adequate and comfortable homes for everyone. Technicians automated existing factories and plants as much as possible so that they could be controlled remotely as the new human dimensions were going to make it at least difficult to use some things or machineries or means of transport such as huge container ships and airplanes.

      Economists and sociologists delighted in making calculations and forecasts and it was clear that, a few days after the transformation, hunger in the world was going to be defeated, the constant need for new land to build on was about to disappear, natural resources were going to be such and abundant that disparities among states were about to be eliminated in a short time and this — together with the technological sharing that was taking place — was going to make each current State self-sufficient in everything.

      This caused some reverse emigration never experienced before: migrants from the poorest regions of the world went back home and so did the refugees, since they were basically going to have the same things both in the country where they lived — or where they wanted to go — and in their homeland. After the transformation, nations were going to keep multi-ethnicity but multiculturalism was about to largely disappear.

      The military made sure that they had very close control over existing weapons and — since each nation was going to have the ability to completely annihilate the population of entire states using just a couple of ‘normal’ conventional missiles, which all of them had — they were also reassured that peace was going to be extremely long-lasting if not eternal, as it would be supported by the mutual threat of total destruction.

      Thousands of Molecular Interspace Modulators — also known as MIMs — were built and placed on as many satellites ready to be launched in geostationary orbit around Earth and everything seemed to go smoothly until Pikelell and the other scientists realized that they could not simply send the MIMs in orbit and shoot or they were going to merely shrink everything and everyone in equal measure and nothing would change. Actually, Earth would probably be thrown out of its orbit into the grip of other celestial bodies’ gravitational force, most likely ending up crashing into the Moon or being consumed by the Sun.

      The solution was provided by a killer belonging to the United Mafianghetorra — also known as MACU — a major criminal organization. He sent Pikelell an envelope containing a bullet and a few words “I take a target’s hair, place it in the bullet then I just have to shoot in the air: the bullet will find its prey, easy isn’t it?”. The idea was simple but great. All they needed was to use the same DNA targeting system as the killer.

      Pikelell and the scientists began modifying MIMs, collecting and mapping DNA of all citizens. This necessity caused protests to rise for the first time. Privacy was invoked. Privacy was contrasted with the survival of a species and perhaps of an entire planet, their planet, and — as far as it was known — the only one where they could live and thrive. The debate lasted a long time and was not an easy one but, in the end, the spirit of survival prevailed. Only a small group of a few thousand people in the end refused to give their DNA. They were invited to move to an island, lost in the middle of the sea, thousands of miles from any mainland. Moreover, they were stripped of all modern technology so that their privacy — which they deemed so important — would not risk being violated.

      The mapping was indeed faster than expected as the scientists were secretly told that almost all the world governments had already been listing newborns’ DNA for at least two generations — some even for three. Once the genetic mapping was over — a fact that drastically brought crime down — the MIMs were launched into orbit. Dozens of launches in record time ensured full coverage.

      When finally tiny apartments and the rest of the plans were completed, everyone gathered as close as possible to their new homes and waited for the big moment. A moment of great emotion. A moment of joy and pain and fear and anticipation. Everyone looked up. There was a blinding flash. A deafening roar. Unnatural pressure forced everyone to the ground and an instant later humanity had been changed forever. Shrunken and ready for a fresh start. A beginning full of possibilities where everyone could aspire to be what they really wanted to be, where there was no hunger in the world, where medicines were enough for everyone, where water was no longer a problem, where energy and electric power was not going to be ever rationed again, where peace among states was about to reign at least for decades, and more.

      Everything looked so perfect that many people thought that they must have done something wrong, but found nothing wrong. Nature was quickly regaining abandoned areas and was not a threat: Animals were driven away by ultrasounds, electromagnetic fields, shields, and — in any case — weapons were always there. The ones belonging to the ‘giants’ era’, as they now used to say when referring to the pre-abundance or pre-shrinking age.

      Wealth was everywhere and work — as it was intended before the great little step of human evolution — was no longer the same. Actually, every citizen was called to work only a couple of months a year; apart from this, everyone could devote themselves to what made them happy without any social pressure. Even lying around drinking beer all day and not lifting a finger was considered a worthy occupation if it contributed to the happiness of the individual as long as it did not harm anyone else. There were also people who decided to work all their lives or for years in a row and this too was