"You do not," says Jim, forcefully, "have permission to kill me."

But the concept does give him pause.

Would it? Holden thinks no -- if the contamination is outside him, it would still be on his corpse, right?

Ugh, that's a bad thought.

"I think," says Holden, "shower would help more than death." A statement that's true a surprising amount of the time, really. "I'm fine, I'm just. I'm tired." He pulls himself up, wavering, palm braced against the wall. The world reels around him. Okay, maybe he was running on more adrenaline than amphetamines. Turns out the body does actually pretty much run out of it, after a while.