100

80 years ago, it began. The big protests of 2050, demanding for justice, for their voices to be heard. The political systems deemed undemocratic and corrupt. Their society seen as one too controlled, too monitored. There wasn’t a place without cameras watching the people, no place to hide. The state was beginning to make people their property and never, never answered questions. There was no justice so action had to be taken.

But instead of justice they were faced with crude brutality. it didn’t not stop them, people with a goal, a goal defining life and many lives after them, cannot be stopped easily.

The protests turned into full on riots, which lasted for on and on 10 years. Many forgot what they were fighting for, faced with brutality, murder, people taking what they can get their hands on, the determined goal fades and instead one of human instinct takes the foreground : survival.

When one by one governments fell, it was supposed to be a victory, a relief. But to many it was not. It was never the goal to completely erase governments, it was to better them. Instead ministers resigned, presidents disappeared. Not that those titles meant anything anymore, no authority had any say anyways.

What is a world without governments? Chaos.

A suppressor is gone but replaced with one perhaps even more dangerous: multiple powers. People began to group up, fending for their group of people and their group only. Some gave themselves names as if they were a gang, yet it was more than that. Not only those of criminal past or needing ties in a society had to join, everyone had to as there was no society left. It was the only way to survive. A lone wolf got nothing, no food, no clear water.

Then the scarcity began. Once the supermarkets and stores had been robbed empty, there was nothing left to get. The once oiled machine of a country had fallen and there seemed no way to get it back up.

The great famines of 2062 were one that only be described as horrific. The elderly and young children suffered greatly, to an extent that women rather not bring children in this world to die. If they could as the famine took a toll on their ability to get children.

The realization that the interdependent world couldn’t live separated like this, some of the districts groups came together. They joined forces, tried to set in place some kind of system. But getting people to perform their duties was hard. How do you get people to listen who’ve lived wildly and free, and without trust in the last few years?

You reward them.

And the best reward was those of survival. Wanted an apple from the gardens? Help in said garden. It turned more complex by the days and years. Do a task, contribute in some way, and you get access to the basic needs.

At one point the system began to expand and to work. The city districts that came up with it began to form the center of life. The districts around them held the systemless, those who still stole and lived with primal morals. Yet those in the centre began to set up the system in more organized ways. They took notes of who did what so that it was clear who contributed.

At one point people got used to it.

But it was still too wary , too complicated. How could you prove that you worked harder than the rest? That you deserved more than your less hard working neighbor?

Technology was the answer.

In the more peaceful years of the system technology returned in all its glory. The prototype of the wristband did not work as well as it should, but it was a start. It could register activities as long as it was already in the system and it was scanned manually. But the problem of “when is it enough, what do you need to do to get access to what” was still present.

The centre District 1 got the answer: points.

They experimented a lot with these. At one point the points got to high and it got confusing. They were lowered, but then there were protests against the unfairness again. So there came a book with all the rules, the New Law. It stated when, how , what points you could obtain.

It began to work.

People participated in the society, no one benefited unless they had worked for it. And with years and years, technology changed the wristband into modern monitors that could register the points perfectly. There was even talk of creating a chip that could be inserted into the skin, but to some that was too far.

The talk scAred them off and they joined the Outlanders. Those outside of the Centre Districts, those who didn’t use a Point System. Those who live as savages. At least that’s what they tell in the Centre.

The system was settled, the new normal. And it’s golden rule :

Contribute or you’re unplaceable. And then you’re gone, to where?

Nowhere.