Micro (novel)

Micro ( English Micro ) is a 2011 published thriller by the American writer Michael Crichton (1942-2008). After his death, Richard Preston's novel was completed.

action

On the Hawaiian island of Oahu , the detective Marcos Rodriguez breaks into the company building of Nanigen Micro Technologies . On behalf of some suppliers, he is supposed to find out what the company wants to produce with the supplied components. In a laboratory he suddenly starts bleeding; When the bleeding got worse, he fled the building and drove to the office of his client in Honolulu . Severely weakened, he tries to tell them about his visit, but they too suddenly begin to bleed. The police later discover the bodies but have no explanation for their death.

A few days later, Nanigen's technical director, Eric Jansen, visits his brother Peter, who is studying in Cambridge . He is accompanied by the company's boss, Vin Drake, and his assistant, Alyson Bender. Drake offers Peter Jansen and five other students to work for Nanigen, as they research in the fields of microbiology , entomology , ethnobotany and phytopathology . Also, the graduate student Danny Minot approved the proposal of Drake to come in a few days with research samples to Hawaii.

One day before his departure, Peter receives a text message from Eric with the message DO NOT COME . He later receives a call from Alyson Bender informing him that Eric has been missing since a boat tour. When Peter arrives in Hawaii, the police show him a video that tourists accidentally made of Erik. It shows how Erik tries to start the engine of his yacht in rough seas and a little later jumps into the sea without a life jacket . Peter discovers on the video that Alyson Bender was on the cliff and was fiddling with a cell phone. Peter learns from a fellow student friend that Alyson called Erik shortly before he jumped into the water. He suspects that Nanigen sabotaged Eric's boat .

The next day, Drake and Bender drive the group to a company-owned arboretum . There Drake explains that Nanigen is working on research into new types of pharmaceutical products and that the local ecosystem is to look for active ingredients of plant and animal origin. Back at the headquarters, visitors learn that Nanigen is able to use the tensor generator - a very strong magnetic field - to reduce the size of objects and living beings by a factor of 10 ³ . When Peter is alone with Drake and Bender, he confronts them with the accusation that he was involved in the disappearance of his brother. Drake admits to having tampered with Erik's boat because he had moral concerns about Nanigen's work. Drake knocks Peter down and discovers a lavalier microphone on him . Since he suspects that the other students have heard his confession, he arranges for the building to be evacuated , but sends the students into the room with the tensor generator. He brings the injured Peter to his fellow students and starts the generator from the control room. The Nanigen employee Jarel Kinsky, who happened to be present, is also reduced to a size of 1.2 cm.

Drake throws Peter into a terrarium that contains a poisonous snake ; as a result of a pheromone that the student Linn pours on him, he is not attacked by the snake. Since Drake has to leave the laboratory in the meantime, Bender hides the group in a paper bag and drives away in their car.

Drake follows her to the Nanigen Arboretum; There the two find out that the students managed to cut a hole in the bag. They decide to stage a car accident on the cliff to simulate the death of the students. Drake kills Bender and pushes her and her car into a ravine.

Through Kinsky, the students learn more about the micro-world: For example, there were several deaths during outdoor operations by micro-people. Although the teams had special weapons, shelters with storage facilities and micro-planes, they were attacked by insects or they contracted the so-called tensor disease. After a few days, blood clotting fails and the micro-people die of internal bleeding. As Kinsky approaches a supply depot, big head ants attack and kill him. In the bunker the students find food and various pieces of equipment from which they build a blowpipe . Drake sends the Nanigen security chief to remove the bunkers. Although the group managed to escape from the bunker, Jenny Linn drowned in a storm. With the help of a campfire made of kukui nut oil , Rick Hutter succeeds in making the curare arrow poison .

Since Drake is not sure whether the students are dead, he sends two scaled-down mercenaries equipped with a walking robot to kill any survivors. The mercenaries shoot Peter Jansen and the botanist Amar Singh with a compressed air rifle . Rick Hutter can kill one of the mercenaries with a poison arrow, the other is killed by a giant crab spider . With the help of the walking robot, the group tries to leave the site, while the German beetle researcher Erika Moll is attacked and killed by Mainas .

In the meantime, the police discovered micro-robots on Rodriguez's body. When the body of Bender is found, the investigating officer suspects Nanigen. The last survivors Karen King, Rick Hutter and Danny Minot meet former Nanigen employee Ben Rourke. He once worked on the development of the tensor generator and built his own station during his expeditions into the micro-world, in which he now lives as a micro-human. The students learn from him that the generator can also be operated by micro-humans and that tensor disease can be stopped by staying in a neodymium magnet. Since Rourke also owns three micro-planes, the students decide to fly to headquarters the next day to avoid death from tensor disease by enlarging. Minot secretly breaks out at night, is attacked by a bat and falls. When Hutter and King take off the next day, they discover Peter's brother Eric. He was attacked by microrobots on his boat, saved himself by jumping into the sea and faked his death. Eric takes the two micro people in his car to the Nanigen company headquarters. There Eric is overwhelmed by Drake and attacked by micro robots. King and Hutter get into the tensor generator and can transform themselves back to their original size. It also enlarges a micro-robot that attacks and kills Drake. The police have meanwhile surrounded the Nanigen headquarters and can free Jansen, King and Hutter. Since the fire brigade has provided a decontamination unit , the micro robots can be removed from their bodies. The enlarged robot triggers a fire in the generator that spreads to the building.

Nanigen employee Dr. Edward Catel escaping the fire. He copied the construction plans of the tensor generator onto his hard drive so that he could sell them to the consortium that commissioned detective Rodriguez to work.

Eric Jansen later learns in the hospital that there will be no investigation against him and that the entire company building has been destroyed. Karen King and Rick Hutter, meanwhile, are wondering if there is any way to return to the micro-world.

literature

Text output

• Micro . Complete edition. Translation by Michael Bayer, Karl Blessing Verlag, 1st edition, Munich 2012, ISBN 978-3-89667-429-6