The Watch in the Sand: Part 5
February 27, 2024
Due to overwhelming medical and economic concerns, two lobbies form a joint petition to Congress, demanding extensive regulation of Nanocule Inc, and the creation and marketing of IANs.
The Medical Practitioners Lobby cites the current high cost and scarcity of medical grade IANs as being prohibitive for family practitioners. The Pharmaceutical Lobby claims that in the future, no drug company will be able to compete with the incredibly cheap and prolific IANs using conventional drug manufacturing methods. Both lobbies claim Nanocule Inc. must be considered a monopoly, and therefore dismantled. The irony does not go unnoticed in the media.
December 9, 2024
Chinese officials reveal their ‘Healthy China’ initiative, mandating all Chinese hospitals use IANs in treating their patients. Several ad campaigns urge citizens to use officially prescribed IANs, as opposed to traditional herbal remedies, or old conventional medicines.
March 6, 2025
Several insurance companies begin to offer cash incentives to those who take IANs regularly, as part of a country-wide wellness program. The first month sees less than ten percent of eligible participants taking advantage of the programs, and the model is considered a failure.
May 1, 2025
The first Dedicated Nanocule Server is established. This server, or Bank, is a repository for all medical information gathered through professional use of Nanocules. This centralizes all medical information for participants and their physicians, while also allowing doctors and scientists to use this anonymous information for research. Due to public concern about security and privacy, almost twice as much money goes to security as establishing the infrastructure.
8:12 am, July 14, 2025
To: Dr_FWilliams@OurLadyHosp_MA
From: S_Franklin234@BosMA
To Doctor Williams,
I’ve never written a post like this before, but I woke up last night feeling sick at the idea that you might never know how much you meant to me.
I don’t know how well you know Doctor Nanki. She has been my family doctor since I was thirty, and she’s the one who referred me to you. She stuck with me even through the first diagnosis of Lou Gehrig’s Disease, she kept me alive for those first five years, and I don’t have a single ill word to say about her. Frankly, I think she was sent by God to help me through this horrible time in my life. So much so, that when she told me about this new treatment with IANs, I didn’t want any part of it because she would have to refer me to someone else. I thank God daily that she won that argument.
Which brings me to you, dear Doctor. When I was first diagnosed, Doctor Nanki did everything she could. We started me on a very specific diet, a lot of foods that I didn’t like, but she told me there were studies that showed they’d help. We tried six different drugs, all brand new, and she says they helped slow the progression of the disease.
I met my husband in college. A bit of a sweet and sappy story, but somehow we managed to have a fairy tale that Walt Disney himself would have begged to put on the screen. He was a good strong man, and he always made sure me and the children were warm and well-fed. He was a carpenter, and he spent half of his days on a construction site building homes for people, and the other half at home, carving picture frames and making furniture for the local craft fair.
We were blessed with three children, Shauna, Tonika, and Devan. They were beautiful children, and are now quite stunning ladies and a wonderfully handsome man. I’m a grandmother now, and I do hope that Tonika finds a young man to take care of her soon, but so far she’s been a bit unlucky in that department.
Forgive me for rambling on about my family, Doctor, but I just want you to realize something. They all still have a mother, and a grandmother, because of you.
I don’t know if you are a man of God, Doctor, but I believe that all doctors need to be. God works in such mysterious ways, and I know that he is working through you, whether you believe in him or not. Those IANs worked a miracle, and I have no doubt they are God’s work. I don’t know if I can tell you, Doctor, exactly how it feels to have this disease. I could feel my body getting slower, and weaker. It hurt to breathe, and I could feel my body shutting down. I’m not ashamed to admit, Doctor, it got so bad I couldn’t stop taking some strong pain medication to try and deal with it. I couldn’t bare it. There must have been fifty nights where I lay awake crying, and wishing my dear departed husband, God rest his soul, was there to hold me and tell me it was alright.
I can’t tell you what it was like to wake up in that bed, for what felt like the first time. I can’t tell you how it felt to tell your child who’s been sitting by your bed for days, changing your bed pan, and injecting the medicine, that you feel you can go to the bathroom on your own. I can’t tell you what it’s like to breathe on your own, and then stand up under your own power for the first time in ages without the use of a walker, or someone’s arm. I can’t tell you what its like to eat a big red steak with Worcester sauce, and crispy baked potatoes with corn and green beans and the tallest frostiest glass of Guinness I ever saw.
I can’t tell you what it’s like to sit in the pew at Shauna’s wedding, knowing I almost missed it. I would have missed it without you, Doctor. My children keep saying you cured me, but they don’t know what I know, and I hope and pray to God almighty that they never do. You didn’t cure me, Doctor. You brought me back from the dead.
May God bless you with every step you take through this life,
Sandra Franklin
To: S_Franklin234@BosMA
From: Dr_FWilliams@OurLadyHosp_MA
I read your post with tears in my eyes. I am so glad to hear that I was able to give you the chance to watch your daughter walk down the aisle. I remember when my son was married, and I can’t imagine or pretend that I could have bared to miss a moment of it.
I’d feel remiss, however, if I took credit where it wasn’t due. You helped us, Mrs. Franklin, in many ways. As you know, the treatment we gave you was part of a trial study. It was an IAN based treatment, and when your primary caregiver signed consent, she also gave us permission to collect real-time information about your body through the IANs we injected into your body, and use that information to improve the IANs we used.
There are two names you should know, Mrs. Franklin. They are Paul Dickenson, and Molly Cholka. They were the first two people we gave this treatment to, and I am sorry to say that they did not survive. But the data we received from their treatments meant that our third attempt saved the life of Kit Worthington, and then you. You were only the fourth person we’ve used this treatment on, and the second successful cure.
There is someone else out there, Mrs. Franklin, who has the same disease you faced. They are out there right now, feeling their limbs grow weaker as you did. But when they come to us, they will have a better, quicker, and more powerful treatment because of you. Our scientists believe no more than twenty people need to be given this treatment before we will be able to approach the public with heads held high, and proclaim that Lou Gehrig’s Disease has been cured once and for all. You helped do that, Mrs. Franklin. God bless you.
And there are other diseases out there that we will soon have the cure for. The information we’ve gathered through your treatment has been uploaded to the Bank — an online library of sorts, that doctors and scientists can access to help design and improve their own IANs. Because you agreed to take part in this experimental treatment, thousands of currently untreatable or chronic diseases may soon be cured completely. Everything from cancer to allergies could be treatable with IANs, because of your help. Again, I say God bless you.
I hate to end my letter with a sobering note, but I would be neglectful in my duty if I did not mention the controversy that you have no doubt seen in the news: there are many who do not see IANs in the same light as you do. Groups such as the Naturalist Movement are good men and women who think IANs are perversions of God’s gifts, and are trying to ban them. I cannot help but think this is because they are afraid of IANs, or see them as cold and dangerous machines. Please, talk to anyone who will listen. Not for me, I don’t care if you even mention my name, but please tell your friends and family the story of how you came to walk again.
Doctor Williams
February 27, 2026
Major advances in computerized automation in the manufacturing sector, as well as faster transportation and improved efficiency in the workplace cause a major increase in unemployment levels in America. Public officials proclaim 19% unemployment is the ’new normal.’
March 3, 2026
Scientists report behavior predicting algorithms have increased in accuracy and detail. The current incarnation can predict users location and detailed behavior with 95% accuracy up to two weeks in the future. Rumors of these algorithms being used for police work are met with public resistance, and are called ‘Precursors to a Pre-Crime Police state.’
April 29, 2026
Great Britain implements a public IAN initiative, allowing citizens to supplement their UHS plan with IANs instead of conventional drugs and methods if they so choose.
June 7, 2026
The first reported police seizure of Street occurs in New York. Street marks a shift in IAN drug crime, as instead of merely selling stolen IANs, Street is the result of dealers making their own.