They swing north of downtown, buzzing the Space Needle, and bend south again to approach the Virginia Mason campus. There are several news trucks parked outside the hospital, along with squad cars flashing their rack lights. The helicopter lands on a roof, and Isaac opens the cargo door and climbs out, then offers his hand to Director Ricketts. She zips herself snugly into her hazmat suit before stepping into the punishing downdraft of the rotor wash.

The hospital’s chief of medicine, a physician named Camille Johnson, meets them at the entry to what is now the contamination ward. Her hair is cut short, a tight web of curls dyed orange. She wears a mask, a PPE shield, and an apron over a long-sleeved green surgical smock tucked into gloves.

They flash their badges and make their introductions.

“Not every day the Department of Defense shows up at my hospital,” she says. “Then again, not every day I see something like this.”

“We believe we can help.”

“Good. Because after COVID, I think the people in this city would rather drown themselves in the Sound than go through another quarantine.” She gives Peaches a head-to-toe look, taking in his checkered button-down and pleated khakis. “Something wrong with your ear?”

“Oh,” he says and touches the tender swell of it. “No. I’m fine. Thank you.”

“Well, if you’re coming inside, we’ll be happy to suit you up.”

“That won’t be necessary,” he says.

Her forehead wrinkles with a question, but before she can ask it, Annabelle says, “Don’t you worry about him.”

Dr. Johnson takes on a lecturing tone: “I’m saying the obvious here, right? It’s not just the risk to him. It’s the risk he poses to others if he walks out of here with—”

She goes silent at the sight of his hand. He holds it in the air between them, as if to shake, but he just wants to show her. Moss furs his knuckles. Vines creep out from beneath his fingernails, curling around and around his fingers, gloving him green before blooming in a burst of white-petaled flowers.

“What are you?” Dr. Johnson says, clinical more than fearful.

The vines retract and he shakes out his hand, shedding petals to the floor. “I’m someone uniquely gifted with the ability to solve your problem.”

“As I said,” Annabelle says. “Don’t you worry about him.”

Dr. Johnson nods warily before waving them forward. They pass two police officers wearing masks, and she pushes open the door to the ICU. The rooms are arranged in a circle, at the center of which is a nurses’ station. From here, you can spin around and take in a 360-degree view of every glass-walled room. Twenty of them altogether. The privacy curtains are pulled back. The lights are on. There is the feel of an aquarium, because inside each room stands a patient.