As I lie here staring at the ceiling, I realize that this is my fate. You might ask why is this my fate. Why can I not change my fate? For you see I am patient zero. What lies beyond the walls of this hospital is my creation, my inheritance and that of my loved ones. Did I mean to create such chaos? I am a good person that cares about others and would never knowingly impose my choice on them. So how did this happen? How did a pandemic affecting 300 million people begin by one simple action, my action? To understand what I have done you need to get to know me. My name is Nathan Miles and I am/was a biomedical engineer. I am twenty-eight years old and been told I am handsome. Of course, in the end none of this matter. I am slim built yet appear strong. I am six-foot 2inches tall with dark brown hair and green eyes. I have been told I have a charismatic smile and indeed I was always smiling. And why not, I had a charmed childhood. Loving parents, devoted siblings were my staple. I was not as yet married but I was married to my career. I enjoyed many friends, most of which are now gone, but I digress. Education came to me naturally and I exceled through the years. Early on I decided I loved science and wished to make a difference. And of course, I did. I chose a career in Biomedical Engineering. The ability to create new tools to help those in the frontlines, the field, was my goal. A medic trying to save a life was my focus. The idea of working with custom designed virial agents was far from my intent. But I am getting ahead of my story. Where was I, oh yes, a young scientist enjoying a wonderful balance of life’s offerings. No serious relationships as yet but maybe someday. I thought of maybe marriage, maybe a family, but I have my whole life ahead of me. So much time to experience it all. Someone wise once told me to live my life to the fullest each and every day. Now I know how truly wise this man was. If I had to live my life all over again would I make the same choices, same decisions? I do not regret my choices, that is a given. Yet knowing another human being on a level of total understanding, total intimacy was far from my choice. So, I completed my postdoctoral work at the prestigious Harvard University Institute for Bioengineering under the tutelage of Dr. Maxwell Tuttle, a world-renowned bioengineer. Although I was at the institute for only two years my work was well received. I was offered a permanent position at the institute. I had the privilege of working with some of the brightest and dedicated young minds. Our 1st project as a team was to work with microscopic robots which we called nanonytes. At this time nanorobotics was an emerging technology. Dr. Tuttle felt that we needed as a team to design, create, and build robots whose components were of the scale of a nanometer. These molecular components could have endless possibilities, but our focus was the human body. Imagine robots moving through the body and repairing all that has gone wrong from injury or disease. We were thrilled and honored to be one of the early adopters of this technology to help mankind, or so we thought. As any engineer we were given a problem to solve and we would brainstorm solutions. Read more…
